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The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of 

Hampole with Special Reference 

to Its Euphuistic Tendencies 



BY 

JOHN PHILIP SCHNEIDER 

u 

Wittenberg College, Springfield, 0. 



2Difl!0ertation 



SUBMITTED TO THE BOARD OF UNIVERSITY STUDIES OF THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY IN 
CONFORMITY WITH THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY 



1906 

3. 5H. 3fur0t Company 



BALTIMORE 






Gift 
Johns Hopk^-.°ttTniv. 
15 '05 



Meiner Schwester Mathilde. 



CONTENTS. 



Page, 

Introduction 1 

I. Some Aspects op Prose in the Fourteenth Century: 

(1.) Preliminary Observations 8 

(2.) Thomas Usk 13 

(3.) Wyclif 19 

(4.) Chaucer and the Boethius 25 

(5.) The Ayenbite of Inwyt 30 

(6.) Conclusion 33 

II. Elements of the Prose Style of Richard Eolle : 

(1.) Sentence Structure 36 

III. Richard Rolle and Cicero 58 

IV. Mechanical Devices : 

(1.) Alliteration 64 

(2.) Repetition 68 

V. Illustrations Drawn from Natural History in Middle 

English Prose 71 

General Conclusions 82 



THE PROSE STYLE OE RICHARD ROLLE OE HAM- 
POLE WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO ITS 
EUPHUISTIC TENDENCIES. 



INTRODUCTION. 



Horstman ^ introduces Richard Rolle of Hampole to the modern 
reader with unstinted enthusiasm, declaring him "one of the 
greatest English writers " and " the true father of English litera- 
ture" (ii, p. xxxv). Undoubtedly in his own day and for some 
generations after, Richard RoUe's vogue was wide, not only among 
the common people because of his good works entitling him to 
saintship almost recognized by the church,^ but also on account of 
his writings which made him according to Horstman (ii, p. xxxv), 
" head and parent of the great mystic and religious writers of the 
fourteenth century — of W. Hilton, Wicliffe, Mirk, etc., all of whom 
received their light from his light and followed in his steps." 

^ C. Horstman, Yorkshire Writers. Richard Rolle of Hampole. An English Father 
of the Church and His Folloivers. 2 vols. London, 1895-96. 

^Cf. B. ten Brink, Early English Literature, New York, 1888, p. 283 : 

"Richard's hermit life did not confine him forever to the same spot. He 
changed his habitation more than once ; but he does not seem to have left the 

diocese of York after his return from Oxford We find him at last in the 

corner of Yorkshire at Hampole, near Doncaster, where he died in 1349. The 
spot became the goal of many pilgrims, drawn by the fame of his saintly life, and 
of the miracles which took place at his grave. His memory was greatly honoured 
by the nuns of the Cistercian convent, which drew no small advantage from the 
added attractions of the place. It was they who caused to be written an Officium 
de sancto Ricardo hereniita, in anticipation of the hermit's canonisation, and its 
Legenda contain nearly all that we know of Hampole' s life." 

See Perry, English Prose Treatises of Richard Rolle de Hampole, E. E. T. S. , 20, 
for the Officium et Legenda. Its opening paragraph reads : 

" Officium de Sancto Ricardo heremita postquam fuerit ab ecclesia canonizatus, 
quia interim non licet publice in ecclesia cantare de eo horas canonicas, vel 
solempnizare festum de ipso. Potest tamen homo euidentiam huius sue eximine 
sanctitatis et vite . . . venerari, et in orationibus privatis eius suflragia petere, 
et se suis precibus commendare. ' ' 

1 



2 The Prose Style of Riohard Bolle of Hampole. 

The present interest in this old master is chiefly historical. 
After all his works, Latin and English, have been collected, how- 
ever, and made accessible to us, that interest may be quickened 
and Horstman's (ii, p. xxxiv) eulogy may be felt to be warranted : 
" Richard Rolle was one of the most remarkable men of his time, 
yea of history. It is a strange and not very creditable fact that one 
of the greatest of Englishmen has hitherto been doomed to oblivion 
... he, one of the noblest champions of humanity, a hero, a 
saint, a martyr . . . has never had his resurrection yet — a for- 
gotten brave. And yet he has rendered greater service to his 
country and to the world at large than all the great names of his 
time." The judgment of ten Brink (p. 291 f.) is more restrained. 
He does not believe with Horstman that " Rolle broke the way of the 
Reformers," for he says, " He formed his whole life not according 
to the directions of an external authority, but in obedience to the 
promptings of an inner voice, which was to him the voice of God. 
Yet we cannot perceive in Richard's theological views the slightest 
deviation from the orthodoxy of that time. He implicitly accepted 
all dogmas, and in the doctrines of the schools, his guides were 
the proved, universally received authorities. Richard belonged to 
the class of men who combine a childlike reverence for ecclesias- 
tical authority and a naive acquiescence in transmitted dogmas, 
with independent fervour of religious life." After giving an ap- 
preciative account of RoUe's life and activity ten Brink concludes, 
" All in all, Hampole is the most notable religious writer of the 
first half of the fourteenth century, and he had a corresponding 
influence upon later religious literature, especially that of the 
fifteenth century." Owing to the small amount of RoUe's prose 
accessible to ten Brink, he ventures no criticism of his qualities 
as a writer. 

Morley, in English Writers, vol. IV, gives Rolle considerable 
space, but it is almost wholly taken up with the Pricke of Con- 
science, Rolle's best known work. With regard to his prose he 
makes no attempt to estimate its quality or its influence on the 
times. Ker, in his " Introduction " to Craik's English Prose, does 
not mention Rolle, while Craik has no extract from his writings. 
Saintsbury, in the Specimens of English Prose Style, omits Rolle 
and his century, while in the Short History of English Literature 



The Prose Style of Richard RoUe of Hampole. 3 

he has but little to say of Kolle as a writer. " His prose treaties," 
he says (p. 75), " contain nothing remarkable as literature, though 
they may, with care, be taken as further stages in the chain which 
leads from the Ancren Riwle to Chaucer's Parson's Tale," This is 
certainly a remarkable statement if it means that the ParsoTi's Tale, 
". little else but a translation, stands on a higher level than either 
the A7ieren Riwle or the best work of Rolle. For Rolle's shorter 
poems, however, Saintsbury (p. 76) has high praise, but finds fault 
with Horstman for saying of them, "the beauty, the melody of these 
lines has never been surpassed." Earle, in his English Prose and 
Hunt, in English Prose and Prose Writers, give no treatment of 
Richard Rolle. It is much more surprising to find in so recent a 
work as that of Snell's,' dealing with the fourteenth century, so little 
attention given to Rolle. " The fruits of his study and meditation 
are," he says (p. 390), "seen in his realistic Prkke of Conseienxie 
wherein he describes the Fall of Man, the Judgment, Hell and 
Heaven, agreeably to orthodox conceptions, and in a less certain 
but more poetical body of lyrical work, as well as in prose." ' 
His few words on the prose of Rolle show that its superior quality 
and considerable quantity had not impressed Snell. This is all 
the more remarkable when we find him declaring, " It has been 
said that in England the tendency to mysticism was most con- 
spicuous in poetry. To this statement there is one notable 
exception — the Ayenhite of Imoyt or in modern phrase. Remorse 
of Conscience." Not the Ayenbite of Inwyt, but the far more 
original treatises and meditations of Richard Rolle should be 
noted as the marked exceptions, and especially so if the account 
of mysticism, as given by Snell,^ is taken into consideration. 

^ F. J. Snell, The Fourteenth Century. Edinburgh and London, 1899. 

* "It is doubtful whether this wave of mysticism can be properly described as 
an intellectual movement. Perhaps it is best compared to the Evangelical revival 
of the last century, which incredulous observers, like Horace Walpole, loved to 
designate as "enthusiasm." The truth is, however, that the movement had 
several phases, and comprehended all of religion which is not purely outward and 
ceremonial. The great articles on which it insisted were a striving after and union 
with God, renunciation of the world, and the cultivation of an inner and spiritual 
life. . . . The essence of mysticism was not a cold assent of the reason to certain 
abstract propositions, but feeling and imagination, the perception of a divine 
beyond invisible to the eye of the flesh, and the glowing response of the heart to 
the abysmal love of God." {Ibid. p. 393. ) 



4 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 

Viewed from his exposition, it is difficult to understand why he 
considers the formal Ayenbite of Inwyt as genuinely mystic, which 
the major part of Rolle's work, written under the influence of 
strong religious ecstasy most certainly is. "The most obvious 
trait," he continues, "in the mystic literature of the fourteenth 
century is its frank adoption of the vernacular." But it is in 
this very use of the vernacular that gives all the more reason why 
Rolle should have been considered in this connection. Horstman 
(ii, p. xxxv) goes far enough to say that Rolle " was the first to 
employ the vernacular." It is safe to say that he first used it to 
any considerable extent, and that his work is more original than 
any other of the period. 

The most recent account of Richard Rolle and his activity is 
from the pen of Dr. Garnett.* Though appreciative in tone it is 
untrustworthy in matters of historic facts, as the following citation 
may serve to show : " He wrote much both in Latin and English 
and preceded Wycliife as a translator or rather paraphraser of 
several portions of Scripture of Avhich only his version of the 
Psalms and Canticles have yet been printed. The two most con- 
siderable of his Latin treatises De Emendatione Vitae and De 
Incendio Amo7'is were translated into English by Richard Misyn in 
1434 and 1435. The most imporant of his English works The 
Pricke of Conscience is in rhyme and extends to seven books. 
It is entirely ascetic in character, a perfect representation of the 
mediaeval view of life as beheld from the cloister, free from every 
symptom of the approaching renaissance except for the acquaint- 
ance with many classical writers, but is highly important in a 
philological point of view from the insight which it affords into 
the character of our language in the early fourteenth century by 
the comparison of the original Northumbrian of the Yorkshire 
hermit with the Southern English dialects into which it has been 
transmuted by copyists. Rolle was certainly a most remarkable 
man, and as author fills the most conspicuous place between 
Layamon and Langland. He performed nearly the same mission 
as, centuries later, Bunyan and Wesley were to discharge in 
quickening the spiritual life of their times : and though he wanted 

^ Eichard Garnett and Edmund Gosse, An Illustrated History of English Litera- 
ture. 4 vols. New York, 1903. Vol. I, p. 92. 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 5 

the creative genius of the former and the administrative genius of 
the latter his verse is much better than Bunyan's, and his prose has 
a delicate aroma lacking in Wesley's. The verse, though seldom 
true poetry, is admirable for its homely energy, but, terse as the 
expression may be, the nature of the subject renders it discursive,^ 
and we shall do him more justice by citing his prose in modernized 
form," Then, after a few words by way of explanation. Dr. 
Garnett quotes a passage from the Epistle on Mixed Ufe,^ and 
ends his notice of Richard Rolle with these words : " It is clear 
that English prose in the middle of the fourteenth century, even 
in the mouth of a Northumbrian, had become capable of tenderness, 
force and true eloquence." It would be more correct to say that 
Rolle translated Petrus Lombardus' ^ commentary and version 
of the Psalms and Canticles. Furthermore, studies^ in Rolle's 
sources do not show that he knew many classical writers. It is 
difficult to prove that he knew even a few, at least at first hand. 
The Priche of Conscience serves well to show his knowledge of 
ecclesiastical authors, as its theme and general tone might indicate. 
Dr. Garnett seems to have had this poem in mind, for one of the 
minor poems might have been quoted without fear of injustice to 
Rolle. But it is with Dr. Garnett's final words and their 
application, that we are most concerned. Apparently he drew 
from Perry's English Prose Treatises of Richard Rolle de Hampole, 
E. E. T. S. 20, published in 1866, without consulting Horstman's 

' This is its title in Horstman, vol. i, p. 264. 

^Cf. H. Middendorf, Studien ilber Rkhard Rolle von Hampole mit besonderer 
Seriicksichtigung seiner Psahnen Commentare. Magdeburg, 1888. This dissertation 
proves conclusively that Rolle's English Psalter, edited by Bramley, is not a 
translation of his Latin Psalter, but, barring a few omissions and additions, a 
faithful translation of Petrus Lombardus' Commeniariuni in Psalmos. In his Latin 
Psalter, which is also greatly indebted to Lombardus, he gives him credit in 
only one place, Ps. cxvin, 11 haec secundum glosarum Lumbardi. Horstman's 
assertion that Rolle's " prose commentary on the Psalms and Canticles is substan- 
tially a translation of his Latin Psalter" (Vol. ii, xxxii ) is incorrect. Horstman 
cannot have known of Middendorf s work. The statement in the Dictionary of 
National Biography, ' ' of hardly less interest than the Pricke of Conscience is Rolle' s 
English paraphrase of the Psalms and Canticles," is likewise misleading. 

^Cf. R. Kohler, " Quellennachweise zu 'The Pricke of Conscience.' " E berths 
JahrbuchfUr rom. und eng. Lit., Vol. VI., p. 196 f. A. Hahn, Quellenuntersuchungen 
zu Richard Rolle's englischen Schriften. Halle, 1900. 



6 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hamrpole. 

volumes which appeared thirty years later. Horstman (i, p. 269) 
assigns the particular treatise, from which Dr. Garnett took his 
selection, to Walter Hilton to whom all the earliest prints assign it. 
From internal evidence we are prepared to say that the treatise is 
most certainly not by Richard Rolle.^ The careful reader could 
never in justice consider it his, for both style and content give un- 
mistakable proof of its non-authenticity. Dr. Garnett' s praise fits 
the selection and it fits Richard Rolle too, but since it is based on 
a misconception, the intended force is unfortunately lost. It is not 
evident why the original dialect was not quoted, for then the reader 
could see for himself the " tenderness, force and true eloquence of 
the passage," and express his own surprise, that it came from the 
mouth of a Northiunbrian. 

The first to bring Rolle's prose to notice was Perry. His volume, 
however, must be consulted with care. Its first selection is not an 
original work of Rolle's, but a translation of the Encomium nominis 
Jesu," which may or may not have been made by him, and the 
ninth selection on Active and Contemplative Life, as has already 
been shown, can no longer be considered his but must be placed 
to the credit of Walter Hilton. In the following year, 1867, 
Matzner embodied the contribution of Perry in the AUenglische 
Sprachproben. Then came Ullman who, in Englische Studien, vir, 
1884, edited the prose Meditatio in connection with his work on 
the Speculum vitae. This early study of UUman's has been followed 
by others of similar technical nature, none of which, however, is 
concerned with Rolle's prose style. In 1884, Bramley edited the 

* Convincing proof that the treatise is not by Eidiard Eolle is found in its 
views on "Active, contemplative and medled life." Kolle knows but two, the 
active and the contemplative, and to him the contemplative is the higher and 
alone worthy of emulation. There is never praise for a third, the medled (of. 
e. g. The Form of Perfect Living, i, 46, 48, and The Fire of Love, Chaps, iv 
and XXII ). Furthermore the application of the active life to Martha and the 
contemplative to Mary, Horstman, i, 267, is foreign to him. For this illustration 
cf. Wyclif, Arnold, i, 383, and the Ayenhite of Limyt, 199. "Contemplative 
life is to him the highest state of existence, and while St. Bernhard ranks it 
between the lower and higlier stages of active life, it transcends to him, all active 
life, — the contemplative cannot sin, not even err, because God would not allow 
it." (Horstman, i, p. xni. ) 

* Cf. Horstman, vol. i, p. 186 ; Hahn, p. 4. 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 7 

largest English work attributed to Rolle, a translation and expo- 
sition of the Psalter and certain Canticles.^ Thus it remained for 
Horstman, not only to publish the numerous poems and prose 
pieces which may or may not be Rolle' s, though attributed to him, 
but also to give the most extended study of the man. This he 
did in the edition already cited, which in addition to a most 
elaborate introduction, contains a long list of works, Latin and 
English, which will form the basis of all future work on the 
genius and activity of Rolle. Horstman accepts or rejects some 
selections on the basis of dialect, peculiarities of language and 
style, or the circumstances of Rolle's life. No attempt has been 
made to establish a canon by means of a closer study of his style. . 
To make some contribution toward that end is one of the purposes 
of this paper. Rolle's style is characteristic enough to justify the 
attempt, for prose that can call forth such praise as Horstman 
bestows is worthy of more attention for its own sake than it has 
yet received. Of Rolle's two epistles. The Form of Perfect Living 
and the Ego dormio et cor meum vig'dat, Horstman writes (ii, p. 
xxxii), "epistles which I do not hesitate to count amongst the 
pearls of Old English literature and which are the more valuable 
because they are the first really original productions and the first 
prose works of medieval English." Concerning Rolle's range and 
powers he says (ii, p. xxxv), " His chief characteristic as a writer 
is originality — he is essentially a genius, everywhere he cuts out 
new ways, lays new foundations. Next he is preeminently a lyric ; 
whether he writes in prose or verse, he writes from feeling, from 
momentary inspiration. Besides, he is of remarkable versatility 
and facility ; he writes with equal ease in Latin and English, in 
verse and prose and in all kinds of verse, frequently mixing prose 
and verse in the same work ; he writes postils, commentaries, 
epistles, satires, polemic treatises, prayers and devotions, lyric and 
didactic poetry, epigrams. His defects lie on the side of method 
and discrimination ; he is weak in argumentation, in developing 
and arranging his ideas. His sense of beauty is natural rather than 
acquired, and his mind is too restless to properly perfect his writings. 

^ H. R. Bramley, The Psalter or Psalms of David and Certain Cantides. With 
a Translation and Exposition in English, etc. Oxford, 1884, 



8 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 

His form is not sufficiently refined, and full of irregularities ; his 
taste not unquestionable ; his style frequently difficult, rambling, full 
of veiled allusions — much depends on the punctuation to make it 
intelligible." There is much in this criticism that is true, but 
from much we must, in the course of this paper, emphatically differ. 
What is said of Rolle's versatility and genius cannot be questioned, 
but the remarks on his style are in need of correction at almost 
every point. They show no discrimination, and as criticism are 
too indefinite to place Richard Rolle in the proper light ; but it 
was Horstman's effort to bring the man to notice, and that he has 
done admirably, placing him in a favorable position for study. 



I. SOME ASPECTS OF PROSE IN THE FOURTEENTH 

CENTURY. 

(1.) Preliminary Observaiions. 

It seems a commonly accepted opinion that our early prose, and 
especially that of the fourteenth century, shows little that is worthy 
of serious attention. At any rate it has received but scant treat- 
ment, notably on the side of its technique, from the historians 
of our prose development. Saintsbury, in an essay introductory 
to his Specimens of English Prose Style, attempts to show what 
the successive characteristics of English prose style have been. 
He begins (p. xviii) with "the invention of printing, though not 
denying the claim of books -written before Caxton set up his press 
to the title of English prose, but simply fixing a term from which 
literary production has been voluminous and uninterupted in its 
volume." The first writer to claim his attention is Malory, and 
he finds that " in the earlier examples (up, it may be said, to Lyly) 
the character of the passages is scarcely characteristic." Saints- 
bury contends that it was not until the reign of Elizabeth was 
pretty well advanced that there is evidence on the part of writers 
to form an English prose style. The long delay is due to the 
regard for Latin, by those who cared for elegance and precision, 
while English was thought " scarcely susceptible of form." Another 
reason he finds in the lack of models, or in the fact that the Ian- 



The. Prose Style of Richard RoUc of Hampole. 9 

guages, Spanish and Italian, which Avere cultivated in England, 
were too " alien from English in all linguistic points to be of much 
service." In a brief paragraph (p. xxxv) he summarizes the matter 
as follows : " The course of English .prose style presents in little the 
following picture. Beginning for the most part with translations 
from Latin or French, with prose versions of prose writings, and 
with theological treatises aiming more at the edification of the 
vulgar than at style, it was not until after the invention of printing 
that it attempted perfection of form. But in its early strivings it 
was hindered, first by the persistent attempt to make an uninflected 
do the duty of an inflected language and secondly, by the curious 
flood of conceits which accompanied or helped or were caused by 
the Spanish and Italian influences of the sixteenth and seventeenth 
centuries." 

In a more recent work. The Flourishing of Romance and Rise 
of Allegory, 1897, Saintsbury shows more generous acknowledg- 
ment for the worth of some early prose, which it is not easy to 
make consistent with his own remarks in the essay just quoted. 
In the chapter on "The Making of English," he says, "T/je Ancren 
Riwle has . . . nothing particularly noticeable in its form, though 
its easy pleasant prose would have been wonderful at the time in 
any other European nation. Even French prose was only just 
beginning to take such form, and had not yet severed itself from 
poetic peculiarities to anything like the same extent. But then 
the unknown author of the Ancren Riide had certainly four or 
five, and perhaps more, centuries of good sound Saxon prose before 
him : while St. Bernard (if he wrote French prose) and even 
Villehardouin had little or nothing but Latin." It would be a 
difficult matter to show wherein " good sound Saxon prose " served 
as a model for the writer of the Ancren Riwle, nor is it clear why 
St. Bernard or Villehardouin could not have written good French 
prose without models. If the Ancren Riwle may be considered 
successful prose it is perhaps as just to charge some of its quality 
to the genius of its author as a prose writer, as it is natural to 
remark that Chaucer's prose is not up to that which his genius as 
a poet would lead us to expect from him. Saintsbury's eflbrt to 



10 The Prose /Style of Richard RoUe of Hampole. 

redeem early French prose is hardly less happy than his attempt/ 
to account for the prose of Chaucer on the ground of the " excep- 
tional talent of its author." It would be no less pertinent to ask 
why the writer of the Ancren Riwle did not leave us a volume of 
fine poetry. 

In the general criticisms of Saintsbury there is not enough regard 
for the weight and effectiveness of early prose when viewed in its 
own light. " In literature as in every product of human skill," 
Pater declares,- " in the moulding of a bell or platter for instance . . . 
wherever the producer so modifies his work as over and above its 
primary use or intention to make it pleasing (to himself of course 
in the first instance) there ' fine ' as opposed to serviceable art 
exists." This shows a more hopefiil starting point for study. 
Prose writing of any period is striving for style as soon as it shows 
traces of adornment. This view may be held without bringing 
one under the charge of Saintsbury.^ " Indeed at the present day 
among a very large proportion of general readers, and among a 
certain number of critics, ' style ' appears to be understood in the 
sense of ornate and semi-metrical style. A work which is not 
'remarkable for style' is a work which does not pile up the 
adjectives, which abstains from rhythm so pronounced that it ceases 
to be rhythm merely and becomes metre, which avoids rather than 
seeks the drawing of attention to originality of expression, and 
which worships no gods but proportion, clearness, closeness of ex- 
pression to idea and (within the limits incident to prose) rhythmical 
arrangement." After all, what such critics mean by style is some- 
thing tangible, although there is much said of indefinable qualities.* 

^ Cf. The Earlier Renaissance, Edinburgh and London, 1901, p. 235 : 

"Chaucer's own prose, interesting and important as it is, has nothing of the 
exceptional and ahnost portentous character of his verse. It fits (with due 
allowance for the exceptional talent of its author) easily and naturally into the 
succession of its kind, from the Ancren Riwle and the various theological exercises 
of the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries. ' ' 

2 Style, Fortnightly Review, Dec. 1888, p. 730. 

^ Cf. Introduction to Specimens, p. xxxi. 

*Cf. e. g., E. L. Stevenson, "On Style in Literature." Contemporary Review, 
Vol. 47 (1885), p. 560: 

"We may now briefly enumerate the elements of style. We have peculiar to 
the prose writer, the task of keeping his phrases large, rhythmical and pleasing to 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 11 

De Quincey^ states it, "Style may be viewed as an organic 
thing and as a mechanic thing." Early, formative prose must 
first be viewed on its mechanical side, on the side of technique. 
It may necessarily be lacking on its organic side, on that of its 
content, and still be remarkable for style, even if it have many of 
the faults enumerated by Saintsbury. Such apparent faults may 
be due to its theory of technique. They are nevertheless a large 
part of its style as the mechanical element is of any style. The 
question of good or bad in the matter of mechanical elements is a 
matter of historic periods, and early prose cannot therefore with 
justice be condemned when its more tangible elements, those devices 
consciously formed and applied, are not taken at their worth in 
their own time. Even Saintsbury confirms this by the reasons he 
gives for placing the beginning of English prose with Maimde- 
ville.^ " Here," he says, " for the first time the subject and the 
idiosyncrasy of the author produce between them a style. There 
are approaches to a style in Chaucer ; but he has kept too close to 
his text in the Boethius, to his subject in the Astrolabe. Wyclif 
might have reached one ; Trevisa probably could not ; Mandeville 
did. His object being to produce his effect by the accumulation 
of interesting marvels, with few models before him except the 
Bible, he mostly affects short sentences and has a trick of beginning 
each with 'And.' This conjunction is dear to the story-teller, 
because it has a sort of arresting and exciting effect upon the hearer, 
by promise of something fresh ; while the long periodic sentence 
besides requiring greater practice is apt to weary readers. The 
vocabulary is simple and rather modern, with few obsolete or 
archaic words. . . . Few books of the time when the spelling is 

the ear, without ever allowing them to fall into the strictly metrical : peculiar 
to the versifier the task of combining his double, treble and quadruple pattern, 
feet and groups, logic and metre — harmonious in diversity : common to both, the 
task of artfully combining the prime elements of language into phrases that shall 
be musical in the mouth ; the task of weaving their argument into a texture of 
committed phrases and rounded periods — but this is particularly binding in the 
case of prose : and again common to both, the task of choosing apt, explicit, and 
communicative words." 

^Thomas De Quincey, Style and Rhetoric and Other Papers, Edinburgh, 1862, 
p. 194. 

^ A Short History of English Literature, p. 151. 



12 The Prose Style of Richard JRoUe of Uampole. 

completely modernized have so little uncouthness about them. And 
one thing (rarely to be said of any author, rarest of one in medieval 
time) is that this author knows when to stop." This shows an 
advance over the opinion expressed in his Essay on English Prose 
Style} We are taken from the invention of printing back to 
Maundeville, but since there was the intention of beginning with 
a duly formed style, why the far more original work of Richard 
Rolle was not chosen is not plain. In the matter of tangible ele- 
ments of style, the burden of Saintsbury's plea, his prose is far 
superior to Maundeville's. 

Professor Ker, in the opening essay to Craik's English Prose, 
shows more regard for our early prose. He finds (p. 10), "so 
much good prose in Europe between the time of Alfred and the 
time of Elizabeth that one may easily forget the enormous diffi- 
culties that stood in the way of it. Long after Alfred there still 
remained as a disturbing force the natural antipathy of the natural 
man to listen to any continuous story except in verse." The 
volume of Craik begins with selections from Wyclif, Chaucer, and 
Maundeville, and, as Professor Ker states it (p. 11), "not with any 
early improvisings of style. The style of these writers is fully 
formed — a common pattern of style, common over all the countries 
of Europe." In spite of this, Ker says (p. 12), " In the fourteenth 
century one need not be surprised to find that a good deal of the 
prose of all the countries of Europe is a little monotonous and 
jaded. . . . Prose literature taught and preached so much that it lost 
all spring and freshness ; it suffered from an absorbing interest in 
the weaker brethren, and became too condescendingly simple. The 
childlike simplicity of medieval prose is sometimes a little hypo- 
critical and fawning." Though neither of the critics quoted seems 
over willing to admit the fact, their concurrent testimony proves 
that we may well look for style in the fourteenth century. They 
show little effort at forming a theory of the prose of the time. 
That such a theory might be formed rests on the admission that 
certain writers possess a common pattern of style. What that 
pattern may be, we are left to infer. 

^Introduction to his Specimens (1885), republished in Miscellaneous Essays, N. 
Y., 1892. 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 13 

"We shall now give brief notes on some of the prose of the 
century, with especial reference to such features which may be 
termed artificial, presenting, in the fact of their employment, evi- 
dence of a desire to form a style. 



(2.) Thomas Usk. 

Of the more prominent texts Usk's Testament of Love ^ is unique 
in the century for its obscurity, rambling style, and heterogeneous 
contents. As Skeat has shown, some sections are merely an inferior 
prose version of Chaucer's House of Fame, others are easily traced 
to the Boethius, still others are almost beyond analysis. Few are 
really clear, and but little in all of it has the mark of originality 
or cleverness. When read after the Boethius, the Testament of Love 
gives one the impression that in Usk we have a weak imitator of 
Chaucer's work and style with all his faults accentuated, because 
Usk did not know that Chaucer's prose was not English prose. 
Slavish adherence to a slavish model produced a startling result. 

Usk's painful propensity for the abstract led him into obscurity 
and vagueness. Often the content is in itself simple enough, but 
Usk did not wish to be simple. As a result we have hazy, uncer- 
tain passages. The Testament was meant to be convincing, but it 
leaves only the impression of indefiniteness and insincerity. Its 
plan is so disjointed, so haphazard, that even slow, careful reading 
leaves the mind dissatisfied. Occasionally a passage stands out as 
interesting, perhaps mainly because of the general dead-level of 
its context : 

"'O! for,' quod she, 'hevenwith skyes that foule cloudes maken and darke 
weders, with gret tempestes and huge, maketh the mery dayes with softe shyning 
sonnes. Also the yere with-draweth floures and beautee of herbes and of erth ; 
the same yere maketh springes and jolite in Vere so to renovel with peinted 
coloures, that erthe semeth as gay as heven. Sees that blasteth and with wawes 
throweth shippes, of whiche the living creatures for greet peril for hem dreden ; 

iW. W. Skeat, Chaucerian and Other Pieces (Vol. vii of Oxford Chaucer), 
Oxford, 1897. Cf. Introduction, p. xx, for conclusive proof that Thomas Usk is 
the author. R. W. Bond, in his "Introductory Essay" to Volume i of The 
Complete Works of John Lyly, 3 vols., Oxford, 1902, p. 144, speaks of "the un- 
known author of the Testament of Love." 



14 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 

right so, the same sees maketh smothe waters and golden sayling, and comforteth 
hem with noble haven that firste were so ferde. Hast thou not (quod she) lerned 
in thy youth, that Jupiter hath in his warderobe bothe garmentes of joye and of 
sorowe ? What wost thou how soone he wol turne of the garment of care, and 
clothe thee in blisse? Parde, it is not ferre fro thee. Lo, an olde proverbe 
aleged by many wyse :— " ^^lian bale is greetest, than is bote a nye-bore." 
Wherof wilt thou dismaye ? Hope wel and serve wel ; and that shal thee save, 
with thy good bileve' " (p. 81). 

" 'What vvoldest thou demen if a man wold yeve three quarters of nobles of 
golde? That were a precious gift ? ' 'Ye, certes,' quod I. ' And what,' quod 
she, 'three quarters ful of perles?' 'Certes,' quod I, 'that were a riche gift.' 
'And what,' quod she, 'of as mokel azure?' Quod I, 'a precious gift at ful.' 
'Were not,' quod she, 'a noble gift of al these atones?' ' In good faith,' quod 
I, ' for wanting of Englissh naming of so noble a worde, I cannot, for precious- 
nesse, yeve it a name.' ' Eightfully,' quod she, 'hast thou demed ; and yet love, 
knit in vertue, passeth al the gold in this erthe. Good wil, accordant to reson, 
with no maner properte may be countrevayled. Al the azure in the worlde is 
nat to accompte in respect of reson. Love that with good wil and reson accord- 
eth, with non erthly riches may nat ben amended' " (p. 127). 

At times Usk uses legitimate artificialities with some skill, but, 
for the length of the piece (145 pages in Skeat), the evidences of a 
desire to be attractive through such means are not abundant, as the 
following lists clearly show. 

Rime : — "O love, whan shal I ben plesed? O charitee, whan shal I ben 
esedV^ (p.7). — "so that fame shal holde down inf ame" (p. 31). — " Now is steward, 
for his achates ; now is courtiour, for his debases ; now is eschetour, for his vironges ; 
now is losel, for his so?(,(/es, personer" (p. 51). — "til grace and blisse of his service 
folowing have him so mokel esed, as his abydinge toforehande hath him disesed" 
(p. 125). — "for though di'onkennesse be foreboden, men shulde not ben drinklesse" 
(p. 132). 

Alliteration : — "as Zanes with /adels their maste to seche, I twalked think- 
inge alone a wonder greet whyle" (p. 15). — "Now, wel of wysdom and of al 
wel the, iwthouten thee may nothing ben lerned" (p. 20). — jSbmtyme, toforn the 
Sonne in the seventh partie was smiten" (p. 50). — "Poore masse-book and lend 
chapelayn, and broken surplice with many an Aole ; good Aoundes and many, to 
Aunt after /iart and Aare, to /ede in their /eastes " (p. 51). — " And /airnesse of 
/eldes ne of habitacions, ne multitude of meyne" (p. 63). — "Parde, the beestes 
that han but feling soules, have suffisaunce in their own selfe ; and ye, that ben 
lyke to god, seken encrese of suffisaunce from so excellent a Arynde of so lowe 
thinges" (p. 64). — "'Certes,' quod I, 'of these thinges Zonge have I had greet 
Zuste to be /erned ; for yet, I wene, goddes wil and his p7'escience accordeth with 
my service in Zovingeof this precious Margarite/^erle'" (p. 114). — "Lo! somtyme 



The Prose Style of Richard RoUe of Hampole. 15 

thou wrytest no art ne art than in no wil to icryte. And right as while thou 
wrytest nat or els wolt nat wryte, it is nat nedeful thee to wryte or else wilne to 
wryte" (p. 122). 

Repetition : Usk shows a preference for repetition. The follow- 
ing sentences show favorite forms : 

"So, sothly, this leud clowdy occupation is not to prayse but by the leude; for 
comunly leude leudeness commandeth" (p. 1). — "so unworthily clothed al-togider 
in the cloiidy cloude oi unconninge" (p. 3). — "Now, good goodly think on this" 
(p. 6). — " O good goodly whan shal the dyce turne ? " (p. 7). — " Wost nat wel thy- 
self, that thou in fourme of making passest nat Adam that eet of the apple? 
Thou passest nat the stedfastnesse of Noe, that eetinge of the grape becom dronke. 
Thou passest nat the chastite of Lothe, that lay by his doughter " (p. 36) . — "but 
every man travayleth by dyvers studye and seketh thilke blisse by dyvers wayes" 
(p. 57). — "For right as he besmyteth the dignites, thilke same thing ayenward 
him smyteth, or else shulde miyte" (p. 68). — " For hjndely werking is so y-put in 
hem, to do suche thinges ; for every kyndely in werking sheweth his kynde'^ (p. 
68). — "And Justice rightiullj jugeth ; and juging departeth to every wight that is 
his owne" (p. 103). — " Eight as men wil not thorow necessity, right so is not love 
of ml thorow necessite ; ne thorow necessite wrought thilke same wU'^ (p. 117). 

Perhaps the most interesting stylistic peculiarity in the Testament- 
is the fondness for grouping illustrative allusions. The mannerism 
is so insistent that the Euphuistic rhetoric is suggested. There is 
no similarity, however, in construction, and little in content : 

" 'Wel,' quod she, 'raddest thou never how Paris of Troye and Heleyne loved 
togider, and yet had they not entrecomuned of speche? Also Acrisius shette 
Dane his doughter in a tour, for suertee that no wight shulde of her have no 
maistry in my service ; and yet Jupiter by signes, without any speche, had al his 
purpose ayenst her fathers wil' " (p. 21). 

' ' For if thou drede suche jangleres, thy viage to make, understand wel, that he 
that dredeth any rayn, to sowe his comes, he shal have than [bare] bernes. Also 
he that is aferd of his clothes, let him daunce naked ! Who nothing undertaketh, 
and namely in my service, nothing acheveth. After grete stormes the weder is 
often mery and smothe. After moche clatering, there is mokil rowning. Thus, 
after jangling wordes, cometh ' huissht ! pees ! and be stille ' " (p. 23) . 

' ' Is nat every thing, a this halfe god, mad buxom to mannes contemplation, 
understandinge in heven and in erthe and in helle ? Hath not man beinge with 
stones, soule of vexing with trees and herbes? Hath he nat soule of felinge, with 
beestes, fisshes, and fowles ? And he hath soule of reson and understanding with 
aungels ; so that in him is knit all maner of ly vinges by a resonable proporcioun ' ' ^ 
(p. 39). 

1 Cf. The Mirror of St. Edmund, Horstman i, 223 : 

" Somme, he base gyffene to be anely with-owttene mare, als unto stanes. Till 



16 The Prose Style of Riehard Rolle of Hampole. 

" ' A ! ha ! ' quod she, 'right so Ese, while she lasteth gloseth and flatereth ; 
and lightly voydeth whan she most pleasauntly sheweth ; and ever, in hir absence, 
she is aboute to do thee tene and sorowe in herte. But Unsely, al-be-it with 
bytande chere, sheweth what she is, and so doth not that other ; wherefore Unsely 
doth not begyle. Selinesse disceyveth ; Unsely put away doute. That oon mak- 
eth men blynde ; that other openeth their eyen in shewinge of wrechidnesse. The 
oon is ful of drede to lese that is not his owne ; that other is sobre, and maketh 
men discharged of mokel hevinesse in burthen. The oon draweth a man from 
very good; the other haleth him to vertue by the hookes of thoughtes'" 
(p. 44). 

' ' If the fyr doth any wight brenne, blame his owne wit that put himselfe so 
far in the hete. Is not fyr gentillest and most comfortable element amonges al 
other ? Fyr is cheef werker in fortheringe sustenaunce to mankynde. Shal fyr 
ben blamed for it brende a foole naturelly, by his own stulty witte in steringe?" 
(p. 56). 

' ' Is not erthe drye ; and water, that is next and betwene th' erthe, is wete ? 
Dry and wete ben contrarie, and mowen not acorde, and yet this discordaunce is 
bounde to acorde by cloudes ; for bothe elementes ben colde. Right so the eyre, 
that is nest the water, is wete ; and eke it is hot. This eyre by his hete con- 
trarieth water that is cold ; but thilke contrariouste is oned by moysture ; for 
bothe be they moyst. Also the fyr, that is next the eyre and it encloseth al 
aboute, is drye, wherthrough it contrarieth eyre, that is wete ; and in hete they 
acorde for bothe they ben bote" (p. 75). 

" For al-though angels blisse be more than Adams was in paradyse, yet may 
it not be denyed, that Adam in paradyse ne had suffisaunce of blisse ; for right 
as greet herte is without al maner of coldenesse, and yet may another herte more 
hete have ; right so nothing defended Adam in paradyse to ben blessed, without 
al maner nede. Al-though aungels blisse be moche more, forsothe, it foloweth 
not [that], lasse than another to have, therfore him nedeth ; but for to wante a 
thing whiche that behoveth to ben had, that may ' nede ' ben cleped : and that 
was not in Adam at the first ginnmg " (p. 140). 

Usk was evidently in doubt as to the effectiveness of his reason- 
ing here, for he adds, "God and the Margaryte weten what I 
mene." We shall compare our next specimen of grouping with 
some of similar tone taken from the Eiiphues : 

"Sottes and foles lete lightly out of mynde the good that men techeth hem. 
I sayd therfore, thy stocke must be stronge, and in greetnesse wel herted : the 
tree is ful feble that et the firste dent falleth. And although frute fayleth oon 

o))er, to be & to lyffe, als to grysse and trees. Till ober, to be, to lyffe, to fele, 
als to bestes. Till oj^er, to be, to lyffe, to fele and with resone to denie, als to 
mane and to angells. For stanes erre, hot )>ay ne hafe nogte lyffe ne felys noghte 
ne demes noghte. Trees are, [&] hay lyffe, hot J^ay fele noghte. . . Men are, 
)>ay lyffe, hay fele and hay deme, and hay erre with stanes, hay lyffe with trees, 
hay fele with bestes, and demys with angells." 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 17 

yere or two, yet shal suche a seson come oon tyme or other, that shal bringe out 
frute that [is parfit]. Fole, have I not sayd toforn this, as tyme hurteth, right 
so ayenward tyme heleth and rewardeth ; and a tree oft fayled is holde more in 
deyntee whan it frute forth bringeth. A marchaunt that for ones lesinge in the 
see no more to aventure thinketh, he shal never with aventure come to richesse. 
So ofte must men on the oke smyte, til the happy dent have entred, whiche with 
the okes owne swaye maketh it to come al at ones. So ofte falleth the lethy 
water on the harde rocke, til it have thorow persed it. The even draught of the 
wyr-drawer maketh the wyr to ben even and supplewerchinge ; and if he stinted 
in his draught, the wyr breketh a-sonder. Every tree wel springeth, whan it is 
wel grounded and not often removed " ^ (p. 135). 

From the Euphues : 

"And though women haue small force to ouercome men by reason, yet haue 
they good Fortune to undermine them by poUycie. The softe di-oppes of raine 
pearce the hard Marble, many strokes ouerthrow the tallest Oke, a silly woman 
in time may make such a breach into a mans hearte as hir teares may enter 
without resistance. ..." (Bond i, 225). 

^Cf. F. Landmann, Der Euphuismus : sein Wesen seine Quelle, seine Geschichte, 
Giessen, 1881, p. 55 : 

"Dieselbe tjberladung mit Vergleiche aus der Naturgeschichte welche ein 
charakterisches Merkmal des Euphuismus bildet, macht sich auch schon hier 
bemerklich." He quotes from Toitel's Miscellany under "Uncertain Authors" 
No. 21, by M. F. : 

"Mans flitting live findes surest stay, where sacred Vertue beareth sway. 

The sturdy Eocke for all her strength by raging Sees is rent in twayne : 

The Marble stone is pearst at length, with little drops of drifting rayne, 

The Oxe dooth yeeld unto the yoke. 

The Steele obeyeth the hammer stroke. 

The stately Stagge, that seemes so stout, by yalping hounds at bay is set, 

The swiftest bird, that fleeth above, is caught at length in Fowler's net. 

The greatest Fish in deepest Brooke, 

Is soon deceived with subtill hooke. ' ' 
Cf. Lord Berners, The Golden hoke of 3Iarcus Aurelius, 1534, Letter iv : 
"O how variable is fortune, and howe soone a mysadventure falleth before our 
eies ? Fortune gyveth these euyls and see it not : with her handes she toucheth 
us, and we fele it not : she tredeth us under fete and we knowe it not : she speaketh 
in our eares, and we here her not : and this is bycause we wyll not knowe her : 
and finally, when we thynke we are most surest, than are we in most peryll. 
Trouth it is, that with a lytell wynd the fruyte falleth fro the tree : and with a 
little sparcle the house is sette a fyre : a small rocke breaketh a great shyppe : and 
with a lyttell stone the legge is hurte. I saye that oftentyme of that we feare not, 
Cometh greatte peryll. In a close Fistula, rather than in an open, the surgyens 
doubte the peryll : I depe styll watei-s the pilote feareth more than in the greate 
hye wawes : of secrete embushmeuts, rather than of open armies, the warrior 
doubteth." 



18 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampoh. 

" The little drops of rayne pearceth harde Marble, yron wyth often liandlinge 
is worne to nothinge. Besides this, industry sheweth hir selfe in other thinges, 
the fertill soyle if it bee neuer tilled doth waxe barren, and that which is most 
noble by nature is made most vyle by negligence. What tree if it bee not topped 
beareth any fruite? What vine if it bee not proyned, bringeth foorth grapes? 
is not the strength of the body tourned to weaknesse throughe too much deli- 
casie, . . .?" (Bondi, 263). 

' ' Wliat lesse then the grayne of Mustardeseede, in time almost what thinge is 
greater then the stalke thereof ? The slender twigge groweth to a stately tree and 
that which with the hand might easily haue bene pulled upp, will hardly with the 
axe be hewen downe. The least sparke, if it bee not quenched will burst into 
flame, the least Moth in time eateth the thickest clothe "... (Bond i, 249). 

We shall end our list of citations from the TestaiJient of Love 
with a few which show Usk in his most artificial vein : 

' ' And certes, I am hevy to thinke on these thinges ; but who shal yeve me 
water ynough to drinke, lest myn eyen drye, for renning stremes of teres ? Who 
shal waylen with me my own happy hevinesse ? Who shal counsaile me now in 
my lyking tene, and in my goodly harse ? I not. For ever the more 1 brenne, 
the more I coveyte ; the more that I sorow, the more thirst I in gladnesse. Who 
shal than yeve me a contrarious drink to stanche the thurste of my blisful bitter- 
nesse ? Lo, thus I brenne and I drenche ; I shiver and I swete. To this reversed 
yvel was never yet ordeyned salve, forsoth al leches ben unconning, save the 
Margaryte alone, any suche remedye to purveye" (p. 18). 

"After whom ever, in my herte, with thursting desyre wete, I do brenne; 
unwasting, I langour and fade ; and the day of my desteny in dethe or in joye I 
onbyde ; but yet in th' end I am comforted by my supposaile, in blisse and in 
joye to determine after my desyres" (p. 114). 

These passages, so extravagant in construction and tone, may be 
paralleled with a characteristic one from North's Dial of Princes, 
which Courthope ^ considers " a caricature by Guevara of the verbal 
antithesis used in moderation by Cicero " : 

' ' And afterwards all well considered, all examined, and all proved, I find that 
the more I eat, the more I die for hunger ; the more I drink, the greater thirst 
I have ; the more I rest, the more I am broken ; the more I sleep, the drowsier 
I am ; the more I have, the more I covet ; the more I desire, the more I am 
tormented ; the more I procure, the less I attain" (Fol. 269).^ 

^ W. J. Courthope, A History of English Poetry, 4 vols., London, 1895-1903, 
vol. II, p. 187. 

^ Cf . The Golden boke of Marcus AureKus, Letter v : 

" I. L yeres of my life, I wolde proue all the vyces of this lyfe, to see if any 
thynge might have satisfied the humayn malyce : And after I had sene all thynge, 
I founde, that the more I dydde eate, the more I dyed for hungre : the more I 



The Prose 8tyle of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 19 

Viewed as a whole the Testament of Love is mainly interesting 
in its capriciousness, in its make-up of forgeries and plagiarisms ; 
but to read it demands patience and fortitude. In the development 
of our prose it holds no place, for it cannot have had many readers. 
It apparently had no imitators, for the effort to equal it would 
have produced absolute nonsense. In its flindamental nature as 
prose it is thoroughly bad. It must be admitted, however, that in 
its artificial tone there is evidence of an earnest endeavor to form 
a style, and that this tone, though not the first in the century, is 
indicative of the direction prose would take in periods when to be 
artificial was the first aim. The Testament, in the face of its many 
faults, will always be remarkable as one of the longest original 
prose monuments of the century. Usk deserves credit for his frank 
acceptance of English as his medium : 

"Let than clerkes endjiien in Latin, for they have the propertee of science, 
and the knowinge in that facultee ; and let Frenchmen in their Frenche also 
endyten their queynt termes, for it is kyndely to their mouthes ; and let us shewe 
our fantasyes in suche wordes as we lerneden of our dames tonge" (p. 2). 

(3.) Wydif. 

In reading the prose of the period, it is a relief to go from the 
unsatisfactory Testament of Love to the work of Wyclif,' interest- 
ing in content and eifective in form and style. Though the 
performance of Usk is small, when compared with the work of 
Wyclif, his pages present more difficulties than do the volumes 
of his contemporary. Troublesome sections in Wyclif are mainly 
so because his theology is difficult or perhaps strange to the reader. 

Wyclif is alive to the dignity of prose. He is clear and concise. 
He had a message for the people and his chief care was that the 
people should understand him. It can hardly be said, therefore, 
that he was trying to produce literature. His zealous haste to say 

slepte, the more sluggye I was : the more I dranke, the more thyrste I hadde, the 
more I rested, the more werye I was : the more good I hadde, the more covetous 
I was : the more I sough te, the lesse I founde." 

^ Thomas Arnold, Select English Works of John Wyclif. 3 vols. Oxford, 1869, 
1871. T. D. Mathew, The English Works of Wychjf Hitherto Unprinted. E. E. T. S. 
74. London, 1880. 



20 The Prose Style of Richard RoUe of Hampole. 

all he had to say, could not brook the painstaking care of the 
conscious stylist, and doubtless his theology too, with its constant 
reminders of the sin of pride, hampered his art. Antichrist and 
the friars, with their " new religions " were rampant ; to overcome 
their influence was his first thought. In his works, passages are 
abundant which show the remarkable strength and bravery of the 
Reformer, yet their tone is often artificial and gives sufficient 
proof of Wyclif 's feeling for good, attractive prose : 

"she, gif H pope or J>i bishop or \>i persoun bidde \>ee do J^at God biddi'S )>ee 
not to do, leve hem )>anne and holde wi'S God. ... As gif J^i pope or )>i bishop 
or \>i persoun bidde J^ee figte or gyve him of hi goodis agens i>e resoun )>at Crist 
haj> jovun, dispise hem utterli, and holde J^e reule J'at Crist techijj ; and ever 
flee >is heresie, J^at J^es fadirs mai not erre here" (Arnold i, 232). 

" As J>is lesyng sprong of preestis, so lesyngis spryngen to day ; to bigynne at 
\>e hye preest, and go bi preestis of his sort. And as it serae}> to many men )>i8 
gabbing smatchij) blasfemye, and so it seme}? grevouser J^an was J^is gabbing of 
princis of Jewes. For i>ei gabidden on Cristis bodi, but J^es gabben agens his 
Godhede. pei seien >at I'ei soilen men boj^e of peyne and of synne ; and jit 
summe sich ben Goddis traitours, >at God jugij' to be dampned. For Jses \>iit Jjus 
disseyven Jje puple blasfemen agens God. And Jjus in lawis and in bullis ben 
gabbingis J'icke sowen ; and freris, clerkis of I^is prince, han sum part in Jpis 
crafte" (Arnold li, 144). 

' ' And as many men in umbre seen betere J^an men in greet ligt, so meke men 
in >is lijt seen betere )>an men in worldli lygt. For men pat seen }>is ligt of 
heven moten nedis be lowe, and se it in umbre. And >us it seme)) l^at many 
prelatis, for J^ei ben hye in i>er sijt, for >ei trowen not in Crist, ben blynde bi 
glorie of pis world" (Arnold ii, 150). 

"And }>us J?at man of \>e world syveh a stoon instide of breed, Ht instide of 
articlis of i>e trouj^e syvej^ doctrinal conclusions : >>ei ben stable in t>ruj>e ever- 
lastinge, but l>ei feden not mannys soule. He syve)> a serpent to mannys soule 
instide of a figsh, Jiat syve}> bisi werkes of }>e world pat venemyn men as an eddre. 
And so fijshis ben medeful werkis, for to gete pe blisse of hevene ; and serpentis 
ben bisie werkis to gete here worldli welfare, pat man syvep a scorpioun in pe 
stide of an ey, pat ■^jve\> worldli frendship or love for love or frendship in God. 
For such worldli frendship mote stynge a man at pe laste, but love in Crist lastip 
evere, til pat it hap brougt a man to blis. And pus, if we taken good hede, 
worldli frendis serven pus men, bitwixe whom pei seien is frendship and love, 
for per jugement is blynd. And pus pe popis, and other prelatis syven ofte to 
per fleishli frendis, stoonys, eddris, and scorpiouns, instide of pingis pat shulden 
fede per soulis. For popis lawis ben harde as stoones, and hie prelacies ben 
eddris, and poweris or privyleges ben scorpiouns to mannys soule" (Arnold 
II, 154). 

" And git pei holden hem in here worldly office, and taken to hem moche of pe 
chirche goodis ; and suffren not to goo to pe scole and lerne pe gospel, to governe 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 21 

here parischenis, but halden hem in balies office, or stiwardis, or kechene clerkis, 
and suffren wolves of helle to strangule here parischenis soulis, bi dyverse synnes 
and harde customes, of veyn sweryng, lecherie and alle ol^ere vices" (Arnold 
III, 277). 

" And here men noten many harmes l>at freris don in ])e Chirche. f>ei spuylen 
]>e puple many weies by ipocrisie and oJ?er leesinges, and bi )>is spuylyng }>ei 
bilden Caymes Castelis to harme of cuntries. pei stelen pore mennis children, 
i>at is werse J^an stele an oxe ; and J^ei stellen gladlich eires, — Y leeve to speke of 
stelyng of wymmen ; and j^us \>ei maken londis bareyne for wij> drawyng of werk- 
men, not al oonli in defaute of cornes, but in beesstis and ot>er good" (Arnold 
m, 348). 

Wyclif is rich in illustration. In sympathy with the powers 
of those he wished to win and convince, he is often homely and 
familiar : 

" pe secounde traveile in J>is vynegerde is to kitte well }>e braunchis ; and J^e 
)>ridde traveile herof were to araile J^es growynge vynes. Sum of his perteynelj 
to God and sum is done bi mannis traveile. God himself maki)j ]>es vynes, and 
plantijj hem in his gerde ; for God makij> trewe men, and 5yveJ> hem witt to 
bryng good fruyte ; and prechours ben helpours of God, and delven aboute bi 
bileve, but God gyve}? \>e growynge, al gif men planten and watren. . . . And so 
J^es laborers have nede to delve aboute J>es rotis, lest yvel eerbis growen here, and 
bastard braunchis wij^outen bileve. pei ben dungid wijp fyve wordis, j^at seint 
Poul wolde teche >a puple. ... pe railynge falli|> to prelatis and ol>er vikeris 
of God. . . . And so ech cristene man shulde helpe his vynegerde ; for growynge 
of coolwortis and o^er wedis maken malencolie and oj^er synnes, and gladen 
hem not, to wende to hevene, but maken hem hevy to falle to helle" (Arnold 
I, 100). 

"And l>us a mous etij> not Cristis bodi, al?;if he ete )>is sacrament ; for \)e mous 
faili)> goostli witt, to chewe in him \>is bileve" (Arnold ii, 170). 

"But as Lucifer covei tide to have ful evenhed bi God, so Antichrist his viker 
wole be moost in worldly worship ; but whan he is heirest, as smoke t>an he shal 
vanishe away" (Arnold ii, 365). 

' ' And t>us many daies comen as fast as ony tyme mai come, for \>ei comen not 
bodili, and Jjus hem nedi> not to have feet. And git many J^ingis comen bodili 
})at walken not bi \>er feet ; as J?e smytyng of t>e stoone come)' bodiU but it walki)> 
not" (Arnold ii, 376). 

"pei schulden fie dalyaunce wij? wymmen, and dwellyng in privey placis, for 
it is hard to touche J>o picche and not be foulid Jjerwi))" (Arnold in, 167). 

" And comynge inne of freris t>at shulden quenche J>is synne makij> it mor fer- 
vent, as watir fier of smyj^is" (vVrnold in, 433). 

In the effort to impress his readers, Wyclif is often severe and 
drastic in tone : 



22 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Ilampole. 

"But J>e fend hah stranglid J^ese houndis wij> talwe, J)at J>ei mai not berke" 
(Arnold I, 247).i 

' ' And so pseudo-clerkes, for her greet covertise, spuylen symple men as wolves 
doone sheepe ; . . . and as the wolf wi}> zoulinge mald)> sheep to flokke for drede, 
so prelatis bi cursinges maken men to gadere hem and jyve J'ese prelatis goodis 
J>at ]>ei wolen have. And jit )>ei hav anober cautel J^at >ese ypocritis usen : 
>ei seien j^at \)ei wolen syven suffragies goostli to menis soulis hat passen al J>is 
world is good ; and to coloure al )>is ypocrisie J>ei, tiirnen her snowte to hevene, 
and seien )>at God govun hem power to sy ve pardone as )>ei wolen ' ' ( Arnold i, 
200). 

"And herfore biddi)> Crist in Matheu, J>at his disciplis gyve not only )>ingis to 
houndis, ne scatere margarites amongis hogges. pes men in a manner ben hovmdis, 
)>at ben J?us hardid in synne Ht after J>e tyme )>at \>ei have spued )>ei turnen agen 
and eeten J^e spuynge" (Arnold n, 330). 

' ' as J>ei maken curatis of many )jousand soulis J>ei wolden not bitake kepyng 
of a fewe hoggis . . . J>erfore i>ei setten more pride bi a fewe hoggis Jjan bi many 
)>ousand souls boujte with Cristis preciouse blood" (Arnold lu, 318). 

To make his prose interesting, Wyclif does not hesitate to call 
on the science of the day, or to use striking facts of contemporary 
history or even to adopt the strange knowledge of the Bestiaries 
and Lapidaries : 

"We shall first wite \>e kynde of salte, and si}> what properties it haj^. . . . 
Clerkis seien J^at salt is maad of gravel and of water, wih hete of J^e sonne or of 
fier, and maad hard with blast of- ]>e wjnd. And by Aristotlis reule it is dis- 
solved bi }>e contrarie. And so cold J>ing and moist dissolvy)> salt, sij? bote t>ing 
and drie makij> it hard " (Arnold i, 267). 

" It is knowun to clerkes of J>ree J>ingis in \>e J^undir, \>e lijtning and ]je noise 
and J>e t)under stoon. J3e listninge is first in brekinge of cloud is, as if two stoones 
on a nygt weren knockid togider, and J>is noise is maad of )>is hard hurtling ; but 
ligt is more swift )>an heeryng in perseyvyng, as sowne comej? softe, but ligt come> 
soone ; and J^is is cause whi )jat ligt is perseyved bifore soun, and )>us comeJ> man- 
nis lijt bifore mannis heering. But J^e >ridde propirte J^at fallij> sum tyme in 
jjundir is as it were a whirlewynd led aboute among cloudis, and comynge to he 
erj^e and doinge J>ere woundris ; and ]>es men hat knowen \>e worchinge of h© 
elementis, how manere of saltis and poudir fleeth fler, and worchih woundir bi 
craft in mevynge of currauntis, woundren lesse of his hundir stoon. Sum tyme, 
it cleveh grete okes in sundir, and sum tyme it meveh grete stones fro her place ; 
some tyme it moltih he swerd in he shehe, and git he shehe is al hool, and many 
ohere woundirs ; and al his is maad bi a sutil mater hat is moved fro he cloudis 
bi kynde of he elementis " (Arnold i, 186). 

iCf. The Ayenbite of Inwyt, E. E. T. S. 23, p. 179 : 

" pe uerste is ssame. het he ne dar nagt zigge his zenne uor ssame and het deh 
he dyuel het him jet beuore he ssame him uor to ssette hane mouh. ase deh he 
hyef het hrauh hane little bal in-to he hondes hrote het he ne ssel nagt berke." 



The Prose Style of Richard Eolle of Hampole. 23 

"Clerkis seien J^at margarites ben prescious stones founden in \>e see wij>in 
shellefishe ; and \>ei ben on two maneres : sum boolid and sum hool. And mar- 
garitis ben a cordial medecine, and \>ei maken faire mennis atire, and conforten 
mennis hertis " (Arnold i, 286). 

"An edder ha> })is witt ; whanne charmeris come to take him, ]>e toon of hise 
eeris he clappijj to the erj^e, and wi)> ];>e eende of his tail he stoppi)3 }>e toj^er. . . . 
And symplenesse of douves stondeJ> in )>is ; \>ei hav no clawis to figte as ojjer 
foulis, but whanne j^ei ben assailed of foulis of raveyne, l?ei tristen not to her 
owne streng}>e, but fallen on stones, and J>ese haukis dreden Jjanne to smyte at 
hem, lest i>ei frushen her owne brest at >e hard stoone" (Arnold i, 201). 

' ' Sum men seien J>at locusta is a litil beest good to ete. Sum men seien it is 
an herbe J^at gaderil> hony upon him, but it is licli t>at it is an herbe J^at mai 
nurishe men, J^at J^ei clepen hony soukil ; but J^is t>ing varie> in many contrees ' ' 
(Arnold ii, 5). 

' ' Clerkis seyen ];>e see is salt, for Jie kynde salt is J'Us gendrid ; whanne gravel is 
hatt wijj \>e sunne, and sokid longe wi> \>e watir, it takij> kyndeli a savour \>ai 
men clepen saltnes. And herfore in summe londis ban men salt for gravel. 
And si)> )>e see ebbij? and flowi}> fro J^e souJj into J^e nor)j, it is needful |>at salt be 
medlid wijj manye sees, and not al oouli wit> sees, but wij> watris where l^e see 
flowi>. ... It is axid comounli whi floodis in lond ben not salt ; and here men 
seien comounly )>at floodis and wellis ben salt whanne ful cause of saltness is 
founde in J^es wellis, but >e see is comounly salt, for it tak\\> moore J>e ligt of 
hevene ; for it is moore, and neer hevene, and moore disposid to take ligt ; but 
bankis and manye ol^ere causis letten flodis to take l>us ligt" (Arnold ui, 68). 

"It is comounly seid >at a whal is ^e moost fisch in j^e see; and so by )jis 
greet fisch ben undirstonden alle o^ere fischis, bo^e schel fische and scalid fisch 
or of what kynde )>at evere l^ei ben. . . . But as beestis ben sotiler J^an ben fischis 
in her schap, so i>ei ben moore venemouse, moore anoyouse unto man ; and >us 
fischis ben neer to elementis and more religious for to ete, )>an ben foulis or 
beestis of ert>e, for J^ei ben neer mannys kynde" (Arnold iii, 69). 

' ' For take a berille-ston, and holde it in a clear sonne, and so l^at ston wol take 
hete of i>e sonne, and l)anne maist J^ou wij? tendre gete fuyre of )>at ston, to do 
herwij) what \>e nedej>" (Arnold iii, 102).^ 

^ These specimens will stand comparison with a few taken from the early Euphu- 
istic Golden boke of Marcus Au7'elius, Letter xiv : 

' ' The Egiptiens saye, that whan the flode of Nyle ranne abrode, and watred the 
erthe, there abode certayne pieces cleuynge together lyke greace, and than the 
heate commynge in them created many wyld beastes : and so amonge them was 
founde the fyrste woman. Note ye ladyes, that it was necessarie, that the flode of 
the Nyle should flowe over his bryrames, that the fyrste woman might be made on 
erthe. All creatures are bredde in the entrailes of theyr mothers, excepte the wo- 
man that was bredde without a mother." 

Let us leve the opinyons of the Egyptiens and come to the Grekes, whiche say, 
that in the desertes of Arabye the sonne shyneth moste bote : and they say, that 
at the begynnynge there appered a woman alone with a byrde called Phenyx, the 
whiche byrde they saye, was created of the water, and the woman of the great 
heate of the sonne, and of the corruption of the powdre that falleth fro the trees, 



24 The Prose Style of Richard RoUe of Hampole. 

Some antithetical and balanced sentences show Wyclif s feeling 
for technique : 

" And as many men in umbre seen betere han men in greet lijt, so meke men 
in this ligt seen betere J>an men in worldli lyst" (Arnold ii, 150). 

"He is not on Cristis side, )jat puttid bis soule for liis sbeepe, but on Anticristis 
side, )>at puttid many soulis for his pryde" (Arnold ii, 254). 

"for \>ei chargen more a litil >ing J^at sowneh to wynnyng of hem, han a myche 
more J^ing >at sownet> to worchip of God" (Arnold ii, 383). 

"For sum men seien Jjat here is J>e pope in Avynoun, for he was well chosen ; 
and sum men seien )>at he is gundir at Rome, for he was first chosen" (Arnold 
n, 402). 

" ffor as Crist chargij> more mennes dedis l^anne her wordis, so he chargi)> more 
vertues Jeanne worldlyche fame" (Arnold iii, 251). 

"Confession generally is knowlechynge made wi}> wille ; and sum confession is 
made wij)0ute synne, and sum in knowlechynge of synne ; & bo)>e )>ise two ben 
goode in man, but l^e first is more wort^e in crist" (Matthew, p. 327). 

" Two virtues ben in mannes soule by whyche a man shuld be rewled ; hooly- 
nesse in mannes wille, & good kunnyng in his witt. hoolynesse shuld put out 
synne, & good kunnyng shuld put out foly ; but as wille hat> principalite to-fore 
witt of mannes soule, so hoolynesse is more wor)>e J^enne is kunn}Tige of synful 
man" (Matthew, p. 327). 

' ' and if a man J>at sloug a lord shulde be hanged for his deJ'C, more shulde }>at 
leche >at slouj a mannes soule be hanged of god for his foly" (Matthew, p. 336). 

In the prose of Wyclif we miss the note of direct address, so 
characteristic of Richard Rolle. The Saviour, bleeding from 
many wounds, was always present to Richard Rolle, inciting him 
to terms of endearment. The following passage may serve to show 
the difference in nature between Rolle and Wyclif. Rolle could 
not be so calm and unimpassioned : 

" pe cros, \>e place, and J^e tyme aggregiden j^e peyne of Crist ; and unkynde- 
nesse of his kynde, and moost synne of hem }iat slowen him. And so }>is lomb 
gaf his blood, }>at is in three places of man. And first he gaf his blood bi scourg- 
ing, t>at was in i>e fleish of Crist ; sij> he jaf his blood of veynes, in his feet and 
in his hondis ; but last he jaf blood of his herte, >at holdit> moost preshious 
blood" (Arnold II, 130). 

whiche the wormes do eate. In this wyse there was a tree soore eaten with 
wormes, and it chaunced by heate of the sonne, and dryth of the powder, that a 
fyre kendled, and soo brennte it : and than of the fyre and powder of the sayd 
brent tree, the fyrste woman was made " (Cf. Diall of Princes, Cap. Lxviii). 

"The sonne with his shynjTige beames dothe parche the fleshe of the people of 
Ethiope bycause hit is nere unto them : and contrarj' wise it doothe no greefe to 
theyr persones that inhabite in the ende of Europe : for bycause it toucheth them 
afarreof" p. 23. 



The Prose Style of Richard UoUe of Hampole. 25 

It was a matter of temperament and of purposes in life. Rolle 
the mystic, with strong lyric feeling, out of sympathy with the 
Scholastics, rarely tried to win by argument, while Wyclif the 
Reformer, trained in the schools, logician and fighter, was argu- 
mentative in the extreme. His prose viewed in its entirety is 
terse and vigorous, not weakened by excessive use of artificialities 
or ornamental devices. Alliteration and other figures of similarity 
in sound rarely occur. Apart from this, Wyclif shows some 
feeling for other stylistic features that are characteristic of later 
English prose in its more artificial periods, 

(4.) Chaucer and the Boethius} 

Concerning the prose of Chaucer it may be said, that there is 
not enough that is original to admit of close study from the view- 
point of prose growth and development. It cannot be shown that 
Chaucer was especially interested in English prose as prose, for 
there are few evidences of a desire to adorn, of a wish to be free 
and unhampered. We never feel that he is indulging in prose 
with the zest and pleasure of one who loves prose. 

Whatever an extended study of his prose and its influence may 
reveal, it seems highly improbable that the statement of Sedgefield,^ 

1 W. W. Skeat, Boetkim and Troilus (Vol. n of Oxford Chaucer), Oxford, 1894. 

*Cf. W. J. Sedgefield, King Alfred's Version of the Consolations of Boethius. Done 
into Modern English with an Introduction, Oxford, 1900, p. xxxiii : 

' ' Geoffrey Chaucer in the beginning of his literary career devoted much of his 
time to translation, and felt himself obliged, in the course of his work, to trans- 
plant hundreds of Norman-French words into his own tongue. By this means 
he made English a more complete instrument than he found it ; and in his literal 
translation of the Consolation of Philosophy he laid the foundations of an English 
philosophical prose." 

Cf. Caroline Pemberton, Queen Elizabeth's Englishings, E. E. T. S. 113, p. xiv : 

"It may be observed that Chaucer's translation is much longer than that of 
the Queen, and that the chief differences between the two translations are in the 
orthography, which undoubtedly also implies a change in pronunciation. Some 
of the obsolete words used by Chaucer have in the Queen's rendering given place 
to others which still survive, such as : delye, smalist, perdurable, laJiting, elde, age. 
On the other hand we find, contrary to expectation, the modern words in Chaucer's 
translation and the obsolete ones in that of Elizabeth, such as : clothes (wides), 
shrunk (skanied) ; which proves that the ancient word and the modern one were 
used indifferently for several centuries." 



26 The Prose Style of Richard Rolte of Itampote. 

that in the Boethms " he laid the foimdatious of an English phil- 
osophical prose," will be substantiated. 

With so fine and inspiring a text it is surprising that Chaucer 
did not make more of it. Norden says/ " In durchaus klassischem 
Stil von einer geradezu bewundernswerten Reinheit ist endlich das 
edelste Werk des ausgehenden Altertums geschrieben, die Conso- 
latio des Boethius. Es ist ausnahmsweise keine Phrase, wenn ihn 
Ennodius in zwei briefen an ihn mit den veteres vergleicht. Der 
Schwung der Gedanken liisst ihn als Verehrer Platons, der Schwiing 
der Sprache als Verehrer Ciceros erkennen." Its very numerous 
and aptly employed allusions, drawn from the wealth of classical 
lore and mythology, gave Chaucer in small compass just what the 
Euphuists read volumes to find. Passages abound which suggest 
Lyly in their succession of illustrative examples, but Chaucer had 
not caught the trick of giving them the form which would enhance 
their force and beauty : 

' ' For sum man hath grete richesses, but he is ashamed of his ungentel linage ; 
and som is renowned of noblesse of kinrede, but he is enclosed in so grete anguisshe 
of nede of thinges, that him were lever that he were unknowe. And som man 
haboundeth both in richesse and noblesse, but yit he bewaileth his chaste lyf, for 
he ne hath no wyf. And som man is wel and selily y-maried, but he hath no 
children, and norissheth his richesses to the eyres of strange folkes. And som 
man is gladed with cliildren, but he wepeth ful sory for the trespas of his sone or 
of his dough ter" (Book n. Prose iv). 

' ' And the iangelinge brid that singeth on the heye braunches, that is to seyn in 
the wode, and after is enclosed in a streyt cage : al-though that the pleyinge 
bisinesse of men yeveth hem honiede drinkes and large metes with swete studie, 
yit natheles, yif thilke brid, skippinge out of hir streyte cage, seeth the agreables 
shadewes of tlie wodes, she defouletli with hir feet hir meetes y-shad, and seketh 
mourninge only the wode ; and twitereth, desiringe the wode, with hir swete 
vols. The yerde of a tree, that is haled a-doun by mighty strengthe, boweth 
redily the crop a-doun ; but yif that the hand of him that it bente lat it gon 
ayein, anon the crop loketh up-right to hevene. The sonne Phebeus, that 
falleth at even in the westrene wawes, retorneth, ayein eftsones his carte, by 
privee path there as it is wont aryse. Alle thinges seken ayein to hir propre 
cours, and alle thinges reioysen hem of hir retorninge ayein to hir nature" 
(Book in, Metre ii).^ 

' E. Norden, Die Antike Kunstprosa vom VI. Jahrhundert V, Chr. bis in die Zeit 
der Renaissance, 2 vols., Leipzig, 1898, vol. ii, 585. 

^This passage, in the translation by George Colvile, or C!oldewel, dedicated 
to Queen Mary in 1556, and therefore antedating the Dial of Princes, reads : 

" Likewise the syngyng byrde that syngeth upon the hygh bowghes in the 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampote. 27 

' ' For wherf or elles bereth lightnesse the flaumbes up, and the weighte presseth 
the erthe a-doun, but for as moche as thilke places and thilke moevinges ben 
convenable to everich of hem ? And forsothe every thing kepeth thilke that is 
acordinge and propre to him, right as thinges that ben contraries and enemys 
corompen hem. And yit the harde thinges, as stones, clyven and holden hir 
parties to-gider right faste and harde, and defenden hem in withstondinge that 
they ne departe nat lightly a-twinne. And the thinges that ben softe and 
fletinge as is water and eyr, they departen lightly, and yeven plac^ to hem that 
breken or devyden hem ; but natheles, they retornen sone ayein in-to the same 
thinges fro whennes they ben arraced. But fyr fleeth and refuseth al devisioun " 
(Book III, Prose xi). 

The two examples just quoted we shall compare with a section 
taken from the Euphues: 

" It is proper for the Palme tree to mounte, the heauyer yon loade it the higher 
it sprowteth. Though yron be made softe with fire it returneth to his hardnes, 
though the Fawlcon be reclaimed to the fist she retyreth to hir haggardnes, the 
whelpe of a Mastife will never be taught to retriue the Partridge, education can 
haue no shew, where the excellencie of nature doth beare sway. The silly 
Mouse will by no manner of meanes be tamed, the subtill Foxe may well be 
beaten, but never broken from stealing his pray . . . plante and translate the 
crabbe tree, where and whensoeuer it please you and it will neuer beare sweet 
apple, unlesse you graft by Arte, which nothing toucheth nature. . . . Doe you 
not knowe that whiche all men doe afiirm and knowe, that blacke will take no 
other colour ? . . . That fire cannot be forced downewarde ? That Nature will 
have course after kinde?" (Bond i, p. 191). 

Portions of the Boethius in didactic tone, and in abundance of 
illustration and set arguments, have a tantalizing way of suggest- 
ing the Euphues. This may be merely additional proof of how 

woode, if she be taken and put into a strayte cage, although the dilygent cure of 
men delytynge in her, geueth her swete drinkes and dyuers meates wyth plesaunt 
labour : yet yf she chaunse to escape out of the strayt cage and seith the plesant 
shadowes of the woodes, beyng sorye of her strayt kepyng, ouerthrowith her metes 
and treadeth them under her fete and flyethe unto the woodes, and there syng- 
eth, and warbleth with swete notes and songs. Also the sprigge or bough of a 
tree by greate vyolence made croked boweth downe the toppe, but when the 
hand of him that boweth it letteth it go at lyberte, it holdethe the toppe upryght 
towarde heuen, that is to sai : it returnyth to his olde naturall course. The 
Sonne lykewyse that at euen before night fallyth (as the poets faine) into the 
westerne waters : by a secrete path retourneth his charyot, to his accustomed 
rysing. So that all thynges naturall do returnne and come agayne, to their 
naturall courses. And all natural things reioyseth at theyr returne to their owne 
nature." Quoted from Sedgefield, op. cit. p. xxxix. 



28 



The Prose Style of Richard JRoUe of Hampole. 



great the debt of the Euphuists was to Latin literature. It does 
show that at least one fine model was accessible to the fourteenth 
century. With the Boethius before him a translator, loving prose 
and handling it with pleasure and boldness, could have come 
dangerously close to Euphuism. An imitator, with bent to equal or 
to outdo it, in its features so suggestive of the Euphuistic rhetoric, 
would have come closer. Usk learned much from the Boethius. 
He at least imitated its fondness for heaping illustrative allusions. 
Richard Rolle, handling alliteration so well and being so inclined to 
rhythm, would have given a more polished, more artificial transla- 
tion, decidedly Euphuistic in tone. Why Chaucer was so slavish is 
not evident. But with Chaucer, as with Elizabeth, close transla- 
tion was the primary aim ; to construct more than ordinary prose 
was secondary. 

It may be of interest to compare some brief passages taken from 
Chaucer's Boethius with some taken from the translation by Eliz- 
abeth,^ who wrote in 1593, fifteen years after the first edition of 
the Euph'ues and just at the close of the vogue for its highly 
artificial style. At times we find Elizabeth translating neatly and 
keeping close to the main feature of the prose fasliion of the period ; 
at other times she is even less artificial than Chaucer : 



Chaucer. 

' ' Yif god is, wliennes comen wikkede 
thinges? And if god ne is, whennes 
comen gode thinges?" (Book i, Prose 
IV). 

' ' But sey me this : sin that thou ne 
doutest nat that this world be governed 
by god, with whiche governailes takes- 
tow hede that it is governed?" (Book 
I, Prose VI). 

" maketh that the menaces of Fortune 
ne ben nat for to dreden, ne the flater- 
inges of hir to ben desired" (Book ii, 
Prose i). 

' ' Yif thou committest and bitakest 
thy sailes to the winde, thou shalt be 
shoven, not thider that thou woldest, 
but whider that the wind shoveth thee " 
(Book II, Prose i). 



Elizabeth. 

"Yf there be a god," quoth he, 
' ' whence corns the euill ? The good 
from whence yf he be not?" 

' ' But tell me, for that thou doutst 
not the world by god be rulde, seest 
thou by what raynes it is guided ? ' ' 



' ' nether makes her fortunes threates 
feard, nor her beguylinges wisched." 



' ' Yf thou woldst throwe the sayles 
to wynde, not whither will wolde, but 
whither the blast doth dryve, so furr 
thou goest." 



iR E. T. S., 113. 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 



29 



Chauceb. 

"Richesses, ben they precious by 
the nature of hem-self, or elles by the 
nature of thee?" (Book ii, Prose v). 

' ' For certes, swiche is the condicioun 
of alle mankinde, that only whan it 
hath knowinge of it-selve, than passeth it 
in noblesse alle other thinges ; and 
whan it forleteth the knowinge of itself, 
than is it brought binethen alle beestes 
(Book II, Prose v). 

"For neither they ne ioigen hem nat 
alwey to goode men, ne maken hem 
alwey goode to whom that they ben 
y-ioigned" (Book ii, Prose vi). 

"first whan I loste my memorie by 
the contagious coniunccioun of the body 
with the sowle ; and eftsones afterward, 
whan I loste it, confounded by the 
charge and by the burdene of my 
sorwe" (Book III, Prose xii). 

' ' Scornest thou me ' ' quod I ; "or elles 
pleyest thou or deceivcst thou vie, that hast 
so woven me with the house of Dedalus, 
so entrelaced that it is unable to be 
unlaced ; thou that other-whyle entrest 
ther thou issest, and other-whyle issest 
ther thou entrest" (Book iii, Prose 
xii). 

"Seestow nat thanne in how grete 
filthe thise shrewes ben y-wrapped, and 
with which cleernesse thise good folk 
shynen? In this sheweth it wel, that 
to goode folk ne lakketh never-mo hir 
medes, ne shrewes lakken never-mo 
tormentes" (Book iv, Prose iii). 



Elizabeth. 

' ' Are riches ey ther thyne, or by their 
nature pretious?" 

"For this is the state of humayn 
nature, that then it exceedes all other, 
whan itself if knowes, but is made baser 
than very beastes, if to know it self it 
leave. ' ' 



' ' who eyther never accompanyes the 
good, nor makes them good whom she 
is neerest." 

"First, when memory I lost, thorow 
bodyes syn, next, prest with sorowes 
burden." 



"Do you dally with me" quoth I, 
' ' & wrap me in undooing laberinth of 
Keason, in which thou entrest in, whence 
thou wentst out, & goest out where thou 
camst in." 



' ' See you not in what a great slowe, 
wicked thinges be wrapt in, & with how 
great a light, godlynes shynith? by 
which tis playne, that never reward 
wantes to good, nor punishment to 
wicked folke." 



When both translations are studied with reference to the quality 
of the prose, that of Chaucer's compares well with the work of 
Elizabeth, living when the feeling for good, finished prose was at 
its height. Both failed to realize what might have been derived 
from so fine an original ; both failed to produce a work truly 
representative of the prose of the times. 



30 The Prose Style of Richard RoUe of Hampole. 

(5.) The Ayenhite of Inwyt. 

In a study of Early English prose based on survivals and anti- 
cipations in style, the Kentish Ayenhite of Inwyt,^ though also a 
translation, is of far greater interest than the prose work of Chaucer. 
In this monument, we find artificialities in startling similarity to 
those usually considered the especial marks and properties of the 
sixteenth century Euphuism. More extended notice of one of these, 
the use of fabulous natural history, is reserved for another chapter. 
Its similarity in contents to the Parson's Tale is so suggestive 
/ that its Old French original, the La Somme des Vices et des Vertus, 
has generally been considered the source of Chaucer's work. A 
recent monograph,^ however, gives conclusive proof that the ulti- 
mate source of the Parson's Tale goes back, not to the Somme, but 
" to a thirteenth century tract by Raymund on Penitence, supple- 
mented by another of the same century, by Peraldus, dealing with 
the Seven Deadly Sins." There is enough similarity, however, 
between the Somme, the Parson's Tale and the two Latin tracts to 
show that the Somme, in the main, must be traced ultimately to 
Latin sources. The point is of value when one of the marked 
stylistic features of the Ayenhite, the use of antithesis, is taken into 
account. We find the same debt to classic and patristic Latin 
which has caused the decided similarity in some points of style 
between Middle English prose and that of the sixteenth century. 
It is only additional proof that the movement which culminated 
in Euphuism had its beginnings " back of Guevara and before the 
Renaissance." ^ 

1 E. E. T. S. 23. 

^Kate O. Petersen, The Sources of the Parson^ s Tale, Kadcliffe College Mono- 
graphs, No. 12, Boston, 1901, p. 78. 

"Moreover, I believe that there is evidence to justify the conclusions : (1) that 
the source of the Parson^s Tale, in general, is a Latin tract by Kaymund of Penna- 
forte, written at least thirty-six years before the Somme of Lorens, and affording 
not only the general structure of the P. T., but also a considerable part of its 
phraseology; and (2) that the digression on the Seven Deadly Sins is not an 
adaptation of Lorens' work, but rather of the Suynma seu Tractatus de Viciis of 
Gulielmus Peraldus, which was also written several years before the Somme." 
Ibid. p. 2. 

^ C. G. Child, John Lyly and Euphuism, Miinchener Beitrage zur rom. und eng. 
Philologie vii, p. 121. 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Ham^mle. 31 

A few citations may serve to show its noticeable stylistic pecu- 
liarity, the frequence of antithetical constructions, and the grouping 
of illustrative examples, usually drawn from the familiar actualities 
of daily life : 

" pe ilke )>et couaytyse lede}> habbel^ zuyche mesure : ase }>e pors wyle. f»et is 
Iheuedi and hotestre of \>e house. })anne ssolle we betuene \>e porse and J>e wombe 
of t>e glotoune : habbe a uayr strif. pe wombe zay|>. ' ich wylle by uol.' pe 
purs zay> ' ich wylle by uol. ' pe wombe zayj? ' ich wylle t>t l^ou ete. and drinke 
and Jjet ]x)U despendi.' And t>e purs zay}> : )?ou ne sselt najt. ich wille J^et l^ou 
loki and wy)> drage. Alias huet ssel he do l^es wreche i>et is ^rel to zuyche tuaye 
kueade Ihordes. Tuo mesures make)> he wygte ymad. \>e mesure of wombe in 
o))remanne house guode and large. And Jjc mesure of the purse of his. J'et is 
zorjuol and scarce " (p. 53). 

" panne zuych uolc bye J> ase is l?et child >et louej? more ane sseawere : Jeanne 
ane kingdom, en eppel : jjanne al his kende. Ac uirtue yefj> grat herte arigt. 
uor uirtue make}? wynne heuene : and onworjji ^e worlde. grat berdone of penonce 
to bare, and alle )>e kueades of ^e worlde onderbere. and gledliche )>olye. and 
uor god to leste to alle \>e asaylinges of }>e dyeule wydstonde. And ase zay> \>e 
wyse seneke. Nagt ne habbe]? more of mygte aye uirtues kueade mysfalles and 
zorges ne al >et fortune may >reapny an do : more J>anne >er byej^ dropen of rayn 
ine i>e ze. Virtue make}? man hardi ase lyoun. Strang ase olyfont. stedeuest and 
lestinde ase ^e zonne J^et alneway yern]> and ne is neure wery. panne J'er ne is 
prowesse : bote virtue" (p. 84). 

* ' Vor Jie more J^et J^e herte is clene and >e uayrer : zuo moche he yzygt \>e face 
of lesu crist J>e more openliche. and t>e more J^et he his yzyz}> openliche : i>e more 
he him loueJ> i>e stranglaker. J>e more he him liknej' propreliche" (p. 88). 

' ' And J>eruore \>e wyse and J^e holy man ine )?ise worlde ine al }>et hi zyej> and 
smacke]' of l^e guodes lostfolle of J^ise worlde : herye)> god. and J>e more wylne)> 
J>e loue of him. and J>e more bet hy yze]> \>e zuete dropes : i>e more hy wylne)) to 
come to )>e welle. And J?eruore |>et hi wyte)> wel J^et J^e more me louej? >ane 
drope : >e more me uor-yet J^e welle. and {>e more J^et lykej? he zuetnesse of J^e 
worlde : }>e lesse me wylnej> \>e zuetnesse of god " (p. 92) . 

' ' He is ase J^e smale ulege J)et makej> J^et hony. and beulyjh stench, and zek}> 
]>e ueldes yfloured. and of ^e floures zouc> ^ane deau huerof hi make)? J>et hony 
uor his hous to astori " (p. 136). 

" Hit is ase hit is of J^e litel childe i>et is \>e kinges zone and eyr of \>e kingriche 
)>et wepl> ine his crete. and najt ne kan of his hegnesse ne of his richesse. He 
is ase \>et simple ssep. ine huam al hit is guod and profitable, and wolle. and 
skin, and uless. and melk. and frut. and dong. and ne wenj> and ne kan najt. 
ne najt ne }>engj? " (p. 137). 

"Prede loue}? wel hege stedes. Mildenesse : i>e loj;e. pis is J^e dyamod of 
noble kende. \>et nele nagt sitte ine gold, ac ine poure metal ase yzen. And zuo 
hit is of be hyeape of huete y-Jjorsse. \>e cornes byej? benej^e and J>et chef a-boue. 
Ac oure Ihord ssel uanni his corn ate daye of dome ase zayj> )?et godspel. and ssel 
J)rawe J>et chef in-to \>e uere : and J?et corn into i>e greynere. pe more J>et J>et 



32 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 

gold is clen]5 : Jje more hit wecj>, and );>e more Jjet hit is heui : J^e ralpre hit ualj) to 
>e botme" (p. 140). 

" pe uerste stape of loue aze zay)> saynt Bernard is huanne \>e man ne can nagt 
louie : bote him-zelue and his ojene guod. pe o>er huanne he beginj> god to 
louie ac hit is uor his ogene guod. pe J^ridde huanne he knau> betere god and 
him loueb propreliche uor his guodnesse. pe uerj^e huanne he is zuo ynome 
of J'e holy loue }?et he ne louie ne him-zelue ne god: (guod?) bote uor god" 
(p. 144). 

" Vor tribulacion : maketh pacience. Asa zay)> zaynte paul. ase j^et uer : mak- 
eth the tegele hard. Wy)>-oute J^ise uirtue non ne is y-proued. ne \>et gold ne 
may by wyJ>-oute uer y-clensed. wyJ?-oute pacience : non ne he}> uictorie. Vor 
huo J>et lyest pacience : he is ouercome. wy))-oute pacience : non ne cona\> to 
perfeccion. perof me yzejj uorbisne ate leste in alle l>e mestyeres J>et me dejj 
mid hand. Moche >oleJ? \>e coupe of gold of strokes of yzen er>an hi by yzet ope 
\>et bord of {?e kinge. and J>e chalis er ha by yblissid and y-zet ope J^ane weued. 
Moche l^oleh ^e tonne of greate strokes er me do J?rin )>et guode wyn. Mochel is 
defouled mit J^e uet of uolleres ^e robe of scarlet er)3an l^et J?e kuen his do an. 
And ase uele migt })0U to l^an vinde uorbisnes : ase ]?er bye}> vrorkmen at paris 
of alle mestyeres. Be >ise uirtue is Strang l>e man ase J>et ysen >iet alle metals 
a-daunte)5. Of grat prise ase l>et gold J^et \>e more hit is ine uere : J>e more hit 
is clene and clyer and tretable. ase l>e salamandre ^et leuej> ine J^e uere. and ase 
|>e viss >et ine ]>e trauailinde wetere : him ba)>ej> and norisseb" (p. 167). 

"Ac >e couaytouse of l>e worlde : J^e more Jpet hi habbe)> I'C lesse hi habbe}>. 
huo )>et mest he)? of mayne and mest him faile}> of mete, and l^et mest hejj hors : 
mest him faylej> gromes and stablen" (p. 210). 

' ' Ine helle J^ou ssel [t] yzi mo zorges : Jeanne me moge deuisy. Ine purgatorie 
mo tormens J>anne me moge jjolye. Ine paradys more blisse J>anne me moge 
wylny. Helle \>e ssel teche hou god awrek)> dyadlych zenne. Purgatorie : J>e 
ssel seawy hou god clenzej^ veniel zenne. lue heuene Jpou sselt yzy openliche 
hou uirtues and guode dedes : bye]? hegliche yolde" (p. 73). 

"Efterwar[d] huerof. Saynt austin zayj?. uor J^et me del> uor te beuly J^ane 
dya)j of >e bodie : me sssel do uor to askapie J^ane dyal> of J>e zaule" (p. 172). 

' ' Vor J?e ilke J^et is dronke is zuo y-nom of wyn : J>et he lyest skele and onder- 
stondinge and is ase adrayngt ine wyin. and huanne he wen)> drinke J>et wyn : 
J>et wyn dryngj> him" (p. 248). 

A few sentences from Child, showing the importance of this 
monument, may fittingly close these brief notes. He says (p. 121) : 

' ' There is notable difference between a mere heaping together of homilies or 
tractates upon the virtues and a work like Loren's which taking the Lord's 
Prayer, Creed, and Commandments as its scheme or skeleton, endeavors to fur- 
nish its readers with a complete body of faith, apparatus of religion, and manual 
of conduct. Narrative composition naturally takes care of itself in a rough way 
as regards the matter of formal unity, but the attainment of it in didactic worlcs 
was immensely more difficult. . . . Works like Loren's must be regarded as the 
exercises in plain hand preparatory for the flourishes of the Guevaras of a later 
day." 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 33 

(G.) Conchmon. 

We shall give here no detailecl notes on the prose of the writer 
known as Maiindevilie. In another chapter, however, will be 
found some account of its best-known artificialty, the fondness for 
allusions from unnatural natural history, — a stylistic feature which 
his period has in common with the prose of the sixteenth century. 
It is much the fashion to consider English prose style as beginning 
with Maundeville/ Snell says (p. 359), that his book of travels 
" is the first attempt in English to liandle prose as Chaucer handles 
verse — with freedom and independence." Even though that be 
granted his prose cannot be submitted to tlie artistic tests which 
may be applied to that of the earlier, more original, Richard 
Rolle. A more suggestive opinion on Maundeville's prose is by 
Dr. Garnett, who says (p. 201), "As Mr. Pollard observes, his 
pre-eminence among prose ^vriters of his day arises not so much 
from actual superiority of talent as from the application of his 
talent to themes of more human and practical interest than prose 
had hitherto essayed, and admitting of treatment in a more agree- 
able style. It may be added that if he had been really an English 
writer his prose would probably not have been so decidedly in 
advance of his contemporaries, but that his translators were able 
to progress by emulating a degree of refinement not yet attained 
by their own language." 

Though the quantity of prose in the fourteenth century is not 
large when compared with the amount of verse, there is sufficient 
to lead to some definite judgment as to the style and its theory. 
Such judgment would become more comprehensive through succes- 
sive studies of individual authors and monuments. One difficulty 
lies in the fact that the texts cannot well be compared with each 
other. Each one seems to stand out as peculiar to itself, but this 
distinctness need not prevent us from forming views on the more 
technical points of style. It Ls, however, this meagreness in well- 
defined fields that hinders comparison on the broader view of 
intellectuality, or in the methods of handling similar subjects. 

^ Cf. Sainteburv, quoted ante p. 11. 



34 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 

Had Chaucer, so susceptible to foreign models, written an original 
narration in prose, we might compare him with Maimdeville. As 
it is his Parson's Tale may, in part, be compared with the Ayenbite 
of Inwyt, but it is only because both are translations of works 
similar in thought and purpose, and doubtless largely indebted to 
the same sources. There are no other Meditations like those of 
Richard Rolle, nor does Rolle ever preach formal sermons as does , 
Wyclif. Rolle is never so argumentative as Wyclif or Usk, but 
Usk's prose has little to distinguish it save its capriciousness and 
obscurity, while Wyclif's is clear and forcible. Rolle's prose 
stands out as the more beautiful and the more original, showing 
the most conscious art in its formation. When reading the various 
pieces in succession, one is impressed at once by the higher level 
of the Rolle specimens. It is the manner that appeals most, while 
in Wyclif it is the matter, showing the man and his work for the 
times. Chaucer's translations, with their monotonous repetitions, 
are of interest mainly because they are his. Rolle in his transla- 
tions seeks variety ; with him repetition is for strength, for adorn- 
ment. Much in Usk's Testament of Love is almost beyond com- 
prehension. He creates the impression, perhaps the strongest in 
the century, that he is earnestly trying to form a style and to 
produce literature, but the effort is so encumbered by the abundance 
of rhetoric that the product is, on the whole, repelling. Imagi- 
nation and vocabulary runs aAvay with him, allowing little thought 
for precision or consistency of plan and form. In no point is 
he the equal of Rolle, whose work is always characterized by a 
restraint that kept the final purpose of his prose ever in mind. 

Rolle cannot be compared with Maundeville mainly because 
their subjects are not of similar nature. His simple, revealing 
passages of narration are good,^ but too brief for study with 

1 Cf. e. g. the Narracio, Horstman i, 192 : 

' ' When I hade takene my syngulere purpose & lefte J>e seculere haby te, and 
I begane mare to serue god )>an mane, it felle one a nyghte als I lay in my ryste, 
in the begynnynge of my conuersyone, J^are appered to me a full faire yonge 
womane J>e whilke I had sene be-fore & t>e whylke luffed me noght lytill in gude 
lufe. And whene I had behaldyne hyre and I was wondyrde why scho com swa 
on nyghte in he wyldyrnes : sodanly, with-owttyne any mare speche, scho laid 
hire besyde me. And whene \>a,i I felyd hir thare, I dred >at scho sulde drawe 



The Prose Style of Richard JRolle of Hampole. 35 

Maundeville's. With Maundeville as with Wyclif it is mostly the 
subject-matter that holds one's interest. He has good stories to tell, 
and these will always find him readers, but his prose shows few traces 
of conscious efforts at adornment, while Rolle's always does. That 
Rolle writes with care is evident from his fine specimens of balance 
and antithesis and from his effective use of alliteration. The 
abrupt manner of stating his points in the opening sentences of 
his treatises may hardly be rated a defect, when their peculiar 
nature is considered. His chapters are logical, his paragraphs 
in the main well constructed, and his sentences, of good average 
length, follow each other smoothly. Only when he is willingly 
epigrammatical is there abruptness. 

Much of Kolle's prose is such as was evidently intended for 
repeated oral reading, for the appeal to the ear is so insistent that 
we feel the eager, constant effort at oratory. First the outward 
sense was to be satisfied, and to bring this about the tangible 
devices in the older prose, devices which stood out so clearly that 
imitation seemed easy, were brought into practice. There was 
little regard for that inner sense by which we judge prose as good 
or bad, often without being able to say why it is good or bad. 
It was too early for imitation of the more subtle prose effects, 
those which come when the writer creates from within. First 
came the admiration for the striking means of decoration, — word 
figures, figures of similarity in soimd, forms of sentences that stand 
out sharply, bits of science and animal lore. To choose and use them 
well marked a fiirther stage. Finally, a stage is reached when 
the effort is made to construct sentences which show more than 
one artificiality, the one setting off the other. 

me to luell, and said J>at I wald ryse & blysse us in J?e name of \>e haly 
trynytee. And scho strenyde me so stallworthely >at I had no moutlie to speake, 
ne no hande to styrre. And wliene I sawe J^at, I perceyuede wele |>are was na 
womane bot J>e deuell in schappe of womane. Tharefore I turnede me to gode 
and with my mynde I said : 'A Jhesu, how precyous es thi blade ! ' makand \>e 
crosse with my fyngere in my breste : and alls faste scho wexe wayke & sodanly 
all was awaye : and I thankked gode t)at delyuerd me. & sothely fra \>at tyme 
furthe I forced me for to luf Jhesu, and ay Jjc mare I profette in }>e luf of Ihesu, 
>e swetter I fand it, & to J>is daye it went noghte fra my mynde. Tharefore, 
blysside be >e name of Jhesu in the worlde of worldes ! " 



36 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 

That we have a progressive effort at the formation of style in 
the fourteenth century must be admitted, for in each monument we 
find portions, very good in their peculiar way, impressing us with 
the conscious desire to produce a style. Viewed from the point 
of stylistic artificialities then in vogue, the prose of Richard Rolle 
in its restraint, originality and design, offers the most favorable 
starting point for study which may in time lead up to a proper 
view of the prose technique of the period. 

II. ELEMENTS OF THE PROSE STYLE OF 
RICHARD ROLLE. 

(1.) Sentence Structure. 

For the study of Richard Rolle' s prose style the following texts, 
assumed as authentic because of their general agreement in lan- 
guage and style, have been chosen ; these are all printed in Horst- 
man's first volume : 

(1) The Form of Perfect Living, Ms. Dd. V. 64. 

(2) Ego dormio et cor meum vigilat, Ms. Cambr. Dd. V. 64. 

(3) The Commandment of Love to God, Ms. Cambr. LI. I. 8. 

(4) Meditatio de Passione Domini, Ms. Cambr. LI. I. 8. 

(5) Meditatio de Passione Domini, Cambr. Addit. 3042. 

(6) On Prayer, Ms. Thornton. 

(7) Meditation on the Passion, and of Three Ai'rotvs of Dooms- 
day, Ms. Rawl. 

(8) On Grace, Ms. Arundel 507. 

(9) Our daily ivorh, Ms. Arundel 507. 

(10) Nanxicio : A tale Pat Rycherde hermet [inade'^, Ms. Thorn- 
ton. 

(11) MoraUa Richardi heremite de natura apis, unde quasi apis 
argumentosa, Ms. Thornton. 

Special attention will be given to the artificial tone of Richard 
Rolle's style, to those peculiarities resembling and anticipating the 
rhetoric of the Euphuists. It will be seen that in some particu- 
lars the likeness between his style and Euphuism is marked, and 
an attempt shall be made to account for these agreements. 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 37 

It must be assumed that Euphuism is analyzable ; that it is so 
constituted as to be capable of being " reduced to its component 
parts." There was synthesis, and hence there may be analysis. 
This distinctness of character, however, does not lessen the diffi- 
culty of forming a set definition,^ which in few words might 
express just what is meant by Euphuism. The attempt of Land- 
mann (p. 23) may be cited in proof of this difficulty : 

" Wenn wir nun noch einmal die charakteristischen Merkmale 
des Euphuismus zusammenfassen, so finden wir dieselben in der 
eigentiimlichen Kombination der Antithese mit der Alliteration, 
der Assonanz, dem Reim uud dem Wortspiel, in der Konformitiit 
und Korrespondenz paralleln Satze, der Hiiufung rhetorischen 
Figuren wie Klimax, rhetorischen Fragen, EinwJinden welche er 
selbst beantwortet, Wiederholung desselben Gedankens in anderer 
Form, ferner in den Anspielungen aus dem Altertum und Ver- 
gleichen aus dem taglichen Leben, nebst der Vorliebe fiir Gleich- 
nisse aus der Naturgeschichte durch Heranziehung seltener objekte 

1 The following definitions are ingenious, but far from accurate when applied to 
Euphuism in its development from Berners to Lyly : 

J. J. Jusserand, The English Novel in the Time of Shaket^peare, London, 1890, p. 
107: 

"Since it is not a natural product, but the mere result of ingenious artifices, 
nothing is easier than to reduce it to its component parts, to take it to pieces, so to 
speak. It consists in an immoderate, prodigious, monstrous use of similes so 
arranged as to set up antithesis in every limb of the sentence. What is peculiar 
to the English imitators, is the employment of alliteration in order to better mark 
the balance of the sentences written for effect. Finally, the kind of similes even 
has something peculiar : they are for the most part borrowed from an imaginary 
ancient history and a fantastic natural history, a sort of mythology of plants and 
stones to which the most extraordinary virtues are attributed. ' ' 

J. A. Symonds, Shakespeare's Predecessors in the English Drama, London, 1884, 
p. 512 : 

' ' Euphuism . . . may be defined as a literary style used by Lyly in his prose 
works and adopted into the language of polite society. It is characterized by a 
superficial tendency to allegory by the abuse of easy classical erudition ; by a striv- 
ing after effect in puns, conceits, and plays on words ; by antithesis of thought and 
diction carried to a wearisome extent, and enforced by alliteration and parisonic 
use of language ; and finally by sententious prolixity in the display of common- 
place reflections. Lyly's euphuism is further and emphatically distinguished by 
the reckless employment of an unreal natural history for the purpose of illustra- 
tion. This constitutes what may be termed the keynote of his affectation. ..." 



38 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 

mit wimderbaren Eigeuschafteu. Dagegen finden wir keine Uber- 
treibung dcr Diktiou an phantastischeu Bildern, allzu kiihnen 
poetischen Hyperbeleu imd Persouifikatioiieu ; mit anderen Wor- 
ten, der Euphuismus ist eine gesmacklose Ubertreibung im 
Gebrauche von rhetorisclien Figuren, nicht Tropen." 

Romanticism in literature, for example, presents a similar diffi- 
culty of definition. With this, as with Euphuism, the fashion to 
fasten on one or another peculiarity has misled many in their 
efforts at definition, though there is far less reason for this with 
Euphuism, which is consistent in its adherence to particular fea- 
tures. The elements of Romanticism and of Euphuism, though 
diffused to a greater or less degree in all periods, only become 
realized with consistency and completeness at favorable epochs. 
Therefore, with due regard for the proper use of the term, we may 
speak of Euphuistic elements in this or that period or author. It 
is no more paradoxical to speak of Euphuistic elements in Early 
English prose than it is to consider Euripides the first Romanti- 
cist.^ The marked subjective attitude of Euripides toward nature 
resembles that attitude which with the Romanticists came to be 
a recognized convention. In like manner, what came to be the 
individual marks of Euphuism may be detected in Early English 
prose, where, though they have not the sanction of formal conven- 
tions, they are nevertheless used in much the same manner and 
spirit as by the Euphuists. It was not until the growing tendency 
toward a distinguishing style was definitely stimulated by transla- 
tions, notably from the Spanish, that these very features came into 
gradual favor again and ultimately reached the extreme refinement 
of use characteristic of Pettie and Lyly. With the style of the 
leading Euphuists, but more especially with that of Lyly, it is 
proposed to measure the prose of Richard Rolle. He uses anti- 
thesis, parison, balance, alliteration. Rolle's style nmst be con- 

^ Cf. H. E.. Fairclough, The Attitude of the Greek Tragedians toward Nature, Tor- 
onto, 1897, p. 34 : 

" Euripides is the first of tJie romanticists." In a foot-note lie refers to Butcher, 
"Dawn of Romanticism in Greek Poetry," in Some Aspects of Greek Genius, " He 
was in fact the first of the sentimental poets, and the forerunner of modern roman- 
ticism." 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 39 

sidered as at least Euphuistic iu tendency, and were it two centuries 
later, there would be no hesitation in considering it so. " Euphu- 
ismus, euphuistisch im strengsten Sinne des Wortes," Wendelstein ^ 
(p. 1) observes, " ist die individuelle Stilart Lyly's. Euphuisierend 
aber wird man mit Recht das Werk nennen welches das eine oder 
andere rhetorische Hilfsmittel in der von Lyly markaut ausge- 
pragten Art enthiilt, also um die Sache concret zu fassen, wo man 
die Lyly'sche Alliteration, wo man die Lyly'schen Vergleiche aus 
der Naturgeschichte oder dem Altertum, wo man Lyly's Antithese 
oder Parallelismus findet, wird die Bezeichnung euphuisierend am 
Platze sein." In his opening chapter Wendelstein endeavors to 
show that some of the accepted features of Euphuism, particularly 
alliteration, must be considered as having long been present in 
English prose. He notes (p. 4) appearances in Caxton's Charles 
the Greie 1485,^ of assonance and rime, and then traces the growth 
in the use of certain of the pronounced marks of Euphuism in the 
authors preceding and contemporaneous with Lyly. This view of 
the early presence in our prose of traits Euphuistic in character 
was suggested by Child (p. 121) when he showed occurrences in 

^ L. Wendelstein, Beitrag zur Vorgeackiehte des Etiphdsmus, Halle, 1902. 

*In his first chapter (Volkstiimliche Elemente — Klang-figuren), Wendelstein 
is especially concerned with the appearance and use of figures depending on simi- 
larity in sound in the sixteenth century, as his summary of results (p. 30) may 
show : 

' ' Uberschaut man das vorhergehende nochmals kurz und zieht daraus die sicli 
ergebenden Schliisse, so erhlilt man folgendes Gesamtresultat. Es lassen sich in 
friihneuenglischer Prosa im grossen Ganzen zwei Arten der Verwendung von 
Klangfiguren unterscheiden : eine vornehm discrete, quantitativ miissige, qualitativ 
kiinstUchere, markierende, in der fiir die geblldete Lesewelt bestimmten Litera- 
ture (More, Elyot) ; daneben eine viel ausgedehntere, derb komische, oft satirische, 
euphonische in den an das Volk gerichteten Schrif ten ( Bygod, Stalbridge) . Neben 
einander treten diese beiden verschiedenen Gebrauchsarten schon friihe in Werken, 
die von Gelehrten an das Volk gerichtet sind (Aschams Toxophilus 1545) oder in 
solchen die sich an hoch und nieder wenden (Latimer, Lever c. 1550). Gleich- 
wohl dauern aber markierende und euphonische Gebrauchsweise auch getrennt 
weiter (Painter-Harman 1567) und erst almahlich finden siesich audi in der fiir 
das vornehme Publikum geschriebenen Litteratur reichlich zusammen (Pettie 
1576, Grange 1577, Lyly 1578)." 

His other chapters, valuable and suggestive, are on ' ' Bhetorische Studien ' ' and 
"Praktische Studien und Lektiire." 



40 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 

the Ayenhite of Inwyt of parisonic constructions and antithesis 
with the " balanced words not infrequently emphasized by allitera- 
tion." . . . "Noting these uses of antithesis," he says, "and with 
it the habit Lorens has of piling up his illustrative allusions a 
half dozen at a time, it is impossible not to feel that we have in 
this thirteenth-century author unmistakable anticipations, prefig- 
urements, of the ' stilo alto.' " Inasmuch as Dan Michel in his 
translation of the Ayenhite and Richard Rolle in original prose, 
give evidences of a tendency toward the Euphuistic style, it may 
not be amiss to apply to their period what Child observes (p. 4) 
of the sixteenth century, " The language itself was at a stage of 
development which made a tendency to preciosity of some sort 
natural, indeed inevitable." Rolle's early date, the absence of 
artificial models designedly chosen, the feeble force of literary 
incentive to employ prose, preclude the hope of finding him close 
to Lyly at all points. Under some categories of the elements of 
the style there will be no examples, but under other more impor- 
tant ones there will be surprisingly many for such early, original 
prose. Their presence leads us to assert that an imitator with more 
pronounced literary instinct, following Rolle, could have created a 
style possessing peculiar artificialities, nearly if not quite as ornate as 
that of the true Euphuism. The material to work with lay at hand. 
Indeed its essential characteristics were possible to prose as early 
as that of the fourteenth century ; but the early writers were too 
serious in handling their instrument. There was neither incentive 
nor tradition to encourage and stimulate them to bring out the 
dormant powers of the language. Had Rolle been bolder in the 
use of alliteration in his specimens of parisonic antithesis, we 
should have had the most striking mark of Euphuism long before 
its day. It is not that Rolle fails to use the same devices as the 
Euphuists, but that the Euphuists use them more frequently, with 
different purposes and higher skill. The writers of this school 
centering around Lyly ^ were not mainly desirous of creating a 

^ Such criticism as the following is neither accurate nor sympathetic, 
David Hanway, The Later Renaissance, Edinburgh and London, 1898, p. 237 : 
"The faults of his style have been made familiar to all the world by Falstaff's 
immortal address to Prince Hal. . . . The antitheses work with the regularity of 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 41 

gaudy style for itself, but rather to improve the language as a 
medium of expression, and this, with his showing of artificialities, 
was doubtless one intention of Richard Rolle. It is plainly evi- 
dent that he was striving to be attractive by reproducing in his 
own work much of that which he admired in his Latin sources. 
No one attempts the antithetical structure, for example, unless 
possessed with a desire, either to imitate a difficult form for the 
mere pleasure of success, or to make his prose better and more 
effective. In this effort to be attractive we find Rolle something 
of a prose artist, doing much to add to the language beauty of form 
and power of expression. Lyly and his school were first of all 

pistons ; there is a steady march past of similes, drawn as often as not from a natu- 
ral history worthy of Sir Jolin Mandeville, and arranged in twos and threes." 

"Two bad models were set before Englishmen about the middle of the queen's 
reign and they unfortunately became and remained for a long time exceedingly 
popular — Lyly's Euphuism, and the wire-drawing, finicking style of Sidney's 
Arcadia, to which no name has ever been given." Ibid. p. 266. Cf. Ibid. p. 268. 

Cf. E. A. Boucke, Associative and Apperceptive Types of Sentence Structure, Jour- 
nal of Germanic Philology, Vol. IV, p. 413 : 

" It is true that the English language likewise had to pass through a period, in 
which the study of Latin during the Humanistic movement left its stamp upon the 
grammatical diction. Another adverse agency in the history of the English lite- 
rary style was the so-called Euphuism, which was imported from Spain and is 
exhibited in the writings of Philip Sidney and John Lylie." 

For more discriminate judgment cf. Bond, op. cit. I, p. 144 : 

' ' We shall be right in assigning to the Euphuist, as representing and including 
his special forerunners. North and Pettie, the praise of asserting, with an emphasis 
hitherto unknown, the absolute importance to prose-writing of the principle of 
Design. These three, and Lyly in particular, recognized the need of, and con- 
sistently aimed at, what has been well denominated the quality of mind in style, 
the treatment of the sentence, not as a haphazard agglomeration of clauses, phrases, 
and words, but as a piece of literary architecture, whose end is foreseen in the 
beginning, and whose parts are calculated to minister to the total effect. Of this 
mental quality, this architectural spirit in style. Antithesis, is the most powerful 
instrument. It may be, it is, the fact that Lyly abused it ; that he harped on this 
string perpetually, to weariness ; that in his devotion to form he forgot its large 
dependence upon matter, and constrained his thought, sometimes by dilution, 
sometimes by compression, to a mould for which it was not always fitted, with the 
effect of unreality in either case. But this is only to say that he had not reached 
the preference for concealed over obtruded art. It cannot affect his claim to have 
taken the first momentous step in the development of English prose, by obeying a 
rule of design and aiming at elegance and precision of form." Cf. Courthope, II, 
p. 201. 



42 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole, 

conscious artists, determined to improve the written language. 
Perhaps Rolle wrote well because he read well, but we suspect 
that natural inclination and his mental attitude, superinduced by 
serious views of life, account for much that is remarkable in his 
style. It would be a matter of " good works " to do well what- 
ever he attempted. 

Before Lyly and his circle English had been considered crude ; 
it was used by the unlearned who knew no Latin. Some writers 
by their introduction of new terms had caused only obscurity and 
confusion.'^ The efforts to remedy matters did much toward pro- 
ducing the genuine Euphuism. Contemporary treatises on Rhetoric 
(Coxe^ 1524, Sherry^ 1550, Wilson^ 1553) must be considered 
as having had decided influence in the formation of the polished, 
conventional prose of the period. These treatises were largely com- 
pilations of Cicero, Quintilian, Erasmus, Melanchthon, etc. If with 
Norden * we trace even Guevara back to classical prose and also see 
^Euphuistic resemblances in some of the Church Fathers,^ we come 
upon the ultimate sources of the most salient features of Euphuism 
on ground which supplied largely the source of our early prose, 
and notably that of the fourteenth century. Hence it should not 
be surprising to contend for Euphuistic elements in the style 
of a man whose reading was so restricted as Richard RoUe's. 
Writers much earlier ^ in fact, when striving after a style fell into 
some traits which we recognize as marks of the true Euphuistic 
prose. In the case of Lyly and his forerunners the choice of 
such features was deliberate, due to admiration ; in the case of 
Rolle and the earlier period it was of necessity, largely occasioned 
by a narrower field of choice, or because some features as allitera- 
tion, for example, seemed natural. In the end the result was the 
same ; the language as a medium of expression became fuller and 

1 Cf. Wendelstein, pp. 38-39. 

2 Cf. Mod. Lang. Notes, 1898, p. 294. 

'For a very comprehensive review of Richard Sherry's, A Treatise of Schemes 
and Tropes and Thomas Wilson's, Arte of Ithetorique, cf. Wendelstein, p. 39 f. 
*Vol. II, p. 789 f. 

^ Cf. L. Bayard, Le Latin de Saint Cyprien, Paris, 1902. 
^ Cf. J. W. Tapper, Tropes and Figures in Anglo-Sawn Prose, Baltimore, 1897. 



The Prose Style of Richard RoUe of Hampole. 43 

more pleasing. If the sixteenth century was largely guided by-i 
its purely rhetorical study/ the fourteenth was influenced by the 
direct imitation of classical and patristic patterns of style. The 
ultimate source of influence in both periods is, however, the same. 
The various periods of English prose, when a reforming ten- 
dency can be detected, show much the same conventionalities in 
vogue, Lyly's manner is finer than Rolle's, just as Macaulay's, or 
Newman's, is more finished and more restrained than Lyly's. It 
is largely a matter of time or environment and of purpose. Lyly, 
to make himself a leader in an artificial age of high literary devel- 
opment, went to extremes. A simplifying process was inevitable. 
This came naturally enough when the content of the prose increased 
in weight and importance. Rolle, writing in an age of verse, of 
feeling and not of thought, develops the structural side of his 
prose. This is remarkable when we remember that he wrote 
far from the centers of culture, with but little scholastic training, 
and what is more, with neither guides nor models of inspira- 
tion in his own tongue. We must look for the reason for some 
of his stylistic qualities in the man himself. His training, 
mode of life, subject matter, and reasons for writing led him 
to perceive likeness and unlikeness. It is the constant theme of 
the joy of heaven and the sorrow of earth, the suffering of the 
Saviour and the thoughtlessness of man, the active life and the 
contemplative life, which put him in such a frame of mind that 

1 Cf. Morley, English Writers, VIII, p. 316 ; Courthope, II, pp. 178, 184, 187, 
201 ; J. C. Collins, Essays and Studies, New York, 1895, p. 96 ; J. E. Spingarn, 
A History of Criticism in the Renaissance, New York, 1899, p. 254. Wendelstein's 
contribution (p. 39) on Sherry's Rhetoric makes a valuable addition to Spingarn' s 
work. 

Cf. Landmann (p. 61) who quotes from Tho's. Elyot's (1534) The Doctrinal of 
Princes made by the noble oratour Isocrates : 

' ' This little book ... I have translated out of greke not presumyng to con- 
tende with thaim, which have done the same in latine : but to the intent onely 
that I wolde assaie, if oiu: English tongue mought receive the quicke and proper 
sentences pronounced by the greekes. And in this experience I have found (if I 
be not much deceived) that the forme of speaking, used by the Greekes, called in 
greeke, and also in latine Phrasis, much nere approcheth to that tonge, which at 
this daie we use than the order of the latine tongue : I meane in the sentences and 
not in wordes." 



44 The Prose Style of Richard RoUe of Hampole. 

antithesis^ became natural in the expression of his thoughts. 
Such form was most effective in presenting the truths he wished 
to enforce. Furthermore, the attractive presentation of old and 
not overabundant themes coming from the Bible and the Fathers 
made artificialities necessary. When he exercises more inward 
vision as in the Meditations, the matter becomes more subjective, 
as is seen not only in their meagre basis, the few actual facts of the 
Crucifixion, but also in the increase of alliteration, metre, repeti- 
tion, and other devices. Of artificialities, however, antithesis and 
balance are the most constant, enough so to be a distinguishing 
mark of his style. 

In a recent work on Rhetoric ^ the author says, " The earliest 
history of the balanced sentence I am not familiar with ; the 
structure may doubtless be found very far back." It is the 
opinion of the present writer that the earliest examples approach- 
ing nearest to the Euphuist's form, are found in the prose of 
Richard Rolle. We shall now take up the matter more in detail. 
Child (p. 43) notes that Lyly's most characteristic artificiality, 
his rhetorical structure, has been commented upon by "every 
critic from Oldys down " but that it took time before its method 
or system was discovered. Child then states that the Euphuistic 
rhetoric " employs but one simple principle in practice, and that 
it applies this not only to the ordering of the single sentence, but 
in every structural relation." He then (p. 44) establishes as " the 
basic principle of the Euphuistic rhetoric . . . the enducement of 

iCf. Boucke, p. 418: 

"Far more important is antithesis, which, as a rule, is ranked among the so-called 
rhetorical figures, but in reality is a fundamental form of the intellectual process, 
as has been justly emphasized by Elster. A clear definition can be obtained by 
contrasting it with metaphor ; the latter is a product of simultaneous association 
(cf. Wundt, p. 557) and appeals to imagination, in so far as it results from think- 
ing in concrete ideas and units of thought. Antithesis rests upon successive asso- 
ciations : it appeals to understanding and aims at explaining an idea by contrasting 
it with another one. It is obvious that metaphor as a rule will not be reflected 
by the sentence-structure, because, it merely substitutes one unit of thought for 
another one. Antithesis, on the contrary, depends entirely on the logical form 
of thought and impresses itself upon the grammatical diction in an unmistakable 
manner." 

"Cf. E. E. Hale, Jr., Constructive Bhetoric, New York, 1896, p. 315. 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 45 

artificial emphasis through Antithesis and Repetition — Antithesis 
to give pointed expression to the thought, Repetition ^ to enforce it. 
This exhibits itself, as regards sentence-form and sentence-rela- 
tion, in the constant employment of elaborate antithetical and 
parallelistic constructions." It may be asserted with confidence 
that this is the same principle apparent in the style of Richard 
Rolle. There is, of course, a great difference in the frequency of 
use between the two writers, but even the most casual reading of 
a page of Rolle is sufficient to show his marked fondness for anti- 
thesis and parallelism. The rhetorical principle is the same, but 
in Lyly because of constant practice encouraged by a strong desire 
to be polished and artificial often for its own sake, the product is 
by far the finer.' A few chosen passages will show the method 
of Rolle. 

From The Form of Perfect Living : 

' ' I knawe J>at ]>i lyfe es gyuen to \>e seruyce of god. pan es it schame till \>e, 
bot if )>ou he als gode, or better, within in J^i sawle, als ^ou ert semand at he syght 
of men. Turne for-J)i ])i thoghtes perfitely till god, als it semes l^at J^ou base done 
\>i body. For I will not J)at J)OU wene J^at all er hali >at base \>e abet of balynes, 
& er noght ocupyed with >e worlde ; ne }>at all er ill J^at melles J>am with erthly 
bysines. Bot }>ai er anly hali, what state or degre I'ai be in, \>e whilk despises all 
erthly thyng, J)at es at say, lufs it noght, & byrnes in ^e luf of Ihesu Criste, & al 
)>air desires er sett til )>e ioy of heuen, & hates al synn, & ceses noght of gode 
werkys, and feles a swetnes in )>aire hert of he lufe with-outen ende : and neuer- 
}>e-latter |>ai Jjynk J)am-self vylest of all, & haldes J^am wretchedest, leste, & lawest. 
pis es hali mens lyf : folow it & be haly. And if )>ou will be in mede with apos- 
tles, thynk noght what J)0U for-soke, bot what J>ou despyses. For als mykell l^ai 
forsake J^at foloues Ihesu Criste, in wilfull pouert, & in mekenes, & in charite, & 
in paeiens, als )>ai may couayte )f>at folows hym noght. And thynk with how 
mykel, & how gude will J^ou presentes Jpi vowes before hym : for till J>at he base 
hys egh ; and if )>ou with gret desyre offer J>i praiers, with grete feruoure couayte 
to se hym, and seke na erthly comforth, bot J?e sauoure of heuen, & in contempla- 
cion J)erof haue M delyte" (Horstman, i, 16). 

" Amore langueo. pir twa wordes er wry ten in J^e boke of lufe, Mt es kalled )>e 
sang of lufe, or ^e sang of sanges. For he )>at mykel lufes, hym lyst oft syng of 
his luf, for ioy hat he or scho base when hai thynk on hat hat hai lufe, namely if 
hair louer be trew & lufand. And his es he Inglisch of thies twa wordes : ' I lan- 
guysch for lufe.' Sere men in erth has sere gyftes & graces of god : bot he special 
gift of has hat ledes solitary lyf, es for to lufe Ihesu Christe. pow says me : ' all 
men lufes hym hat haldes his comawndementes. ' Soth it es. Bot all men hat 

^Defined in a foot-note, "A general term, designed to cover every structural 
relation which the word parallelism properly does not." 



46 The Prose Style of Riclmrd Rolle of Hampoh. 

kepes his byddynges, kepes noght also his cownsayle. And all that dos hia 
cownsell, er noght also fulfyld of );>e swetnes of his lufe, ne feles noght i>e fyre of 
byrnand luf of hert. For >i, J^e diuersite of lufe, makes i>e diuersite of halynes & 
of mede. In heuen, ^e awngels )>at er byrnandest in lufe, er nerrest god. Also 
men & women )>at maste has of goddes lufe, whether J)ai do penance or nane : J)ai 
sail be in j)e heghest degre in heuen ; J>ai )>at lufes hym lesse, in J>e lawer order. 
If Jjou lufe hym mykel : mykel ioy & swetnes & byrnyng J>ou feles in his lufe, J>at 
es |>i comforth & strengh, nyght & day. If J^i lufe be not byrnand in hym : litel 
es \>i delyte. For hym may naman fele in ioy & swetnes, bot if l>ai be clene, & 
fylled with his lufe : and J>artill sal J>ou com with grete trauayle in praier & 
thynkyng : hauand swilk meditacions j^at er al in J)e lufe & in J>e louyng of god" 
(Horstman, i, 29-30). 

From the Commandment of Love to God : 

' ' pi luf es singuler : when al )>i delyte es in Ihesu Cryste, & in nane other thyng 
fyndes ioy & comforth. In J>is degre es lufe stalworth as dede, & hard as hell. 
For als dede slas al lyuand thyng in J>is worlde, sa perfite lufe slas in a mans sawle 
all fleschly desyres and erthly couaytise. And als hell spares noght til dede men, 
bot tormentes al bat commes l>artill, alswa a man J^at es in l>is degre of lufe, noght 
anly he forsakes J>e wretched solace of ^is lyf, bot alswa he couaytes to sofer pynes 
for goddes lufe. parfore if )>e lyst lufe any thyng, lufe Ihesu Criste, J>at es Jje 
fayrest, richest, & wysest ; whas lufe lastes in ioy endles" (Horstman, i, 63). 

A few of the more striking examples of RoUe's sentence structure 
will show the extent of his technical skill. Such sentences as 
these cannot have been undesignedly written. They show that 
Rolle planned with care, eager to write so well that his work 
would be pleasing to himself at least. It never leaves the im- 
pression of "trick writing" or of over-wrought device. In the 
use of his power Rolle shows proper restraint. The specimens 
presented are all from the first volume of Horstman : ^ 

^ That the specimens of this chapter may compare in point of construction with 
many in the work of the early Euphuists, the following citations will show ; 

From The Oolden boke of Marcus Aurelitis : 

" If the people were such as they ought to be one shuld rather torne from yll to 
good for many, than that many for one shulde tourne from good to yl " (p. 7). 

"It is shewed us by trees, how we ought to norishe our children. Of trouthe 
the chestain trees bringe forth the softe swete chestnut out of the sharpe prickinge 
and hard huske : And on the nut trees amonge the swete softe leaves, is nourisshed 
the hard nutte. Appleing this to our purpose we have seene a pitiefull father, 
bringe forthe a cruell son, and a cruell father a pitieful sonne" (p. 16). 

"For the myserable ryche persone, the more that he encreaseth in rychesse, the 
more he diminisheth in frendes, and groweth in enemyes to his domage. And he 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolls of Hampole. 47 

"For I hope )>at god will do swilk thoghtes in \>\ hert, als he es payde of, & 
als )>ou ert orda3aide for" (p. 30). 

" Blyssed es he or scho Jjat es in Jjis degre : bot zitt er \>dl blyssedar )>at myght 
halde )>\s, degre " (p. 31). 

" Trowth may be withouten lufe : bot it may noght helpe withouten it " (p. 36). 

"With-outen )>at, na man may pay god; with J>at, na man synnes" (p. 37). 

" We sail afiorce [vs] at cleth vs in lufe als \>e yren or J^e cole dose in J>e fyre, 

als \>e ayer dose in >e son ; als )>e woU dose in }>e hewe. pe cole swa clethes it 
in \>e fyre, t>at al es fyre. [f»e ayre swa clethes it in \>e son ^at al es ligth]. And 
J>e woll swa substancialy takes he hewe, ^at it es lik it. In ^is maner sail a trewe 
lufar of Ihesu Criste do : his hert sal swa byrne in lufe, Mt it sal he turned in til 
fyre of lufe, & be als it war al fire ; and he sal sa schyne in vertues, >at in na 
parte of hym he be myrke in vices ' ' (p. 37 ). 

'*If bou will aske how gode es he or scho : ask how mykel lufes he or scho" 
(p. 37). 

"For whare sa couaityse es : >are es na lufe of Cryste. J^an, if he haue na 
couaytyse : signe es )>at he hase lufe" (p. 43). 

"For many lufes god whils \>2i\ er in ese : and in aduersite >ai grotche, & falles 
in swa mykel sarynes, J>at unneth may any man comforth \>2iVa. ; and swa sclawnder 
)>ai god, flytand & feghtand agayne his domes. And J^at es a caytif louyng ^at any 
welth of J>e worlde makes ; bot >at loujTig es of mykel pryce, l^at na violence of 
sorow may do a- way" (p. 44). 

" Men thynk it swete to synne : bot l>aire mede, J^at es ordand for )>am, es bitterer 
t)an \>& gall, sowrar \>an J>e atter, war J)an al J^e waa >at we may here se or fele" 
(p. 53). 

that is wytte, the wyser that he is, the better he is beloved of theym that be good, 
and feared of them that be yll for his profyte " (p. 48). 

"For a good man alway lyveth in dyenge, and the yll alwayes dyeth in lyv- 
ynge" (Letter vi). 

' ' Of trouth if it lay in my handes to do, I had rather give lyf e to a symple oxe 
than to a malicyous ideote. For the beast liveth for the utilite of dyuers, without 
doynge domage to any other : and the symple ideot man liveth to the domage of 
all other and without profyte to any person " (Cap. xxix). 

"The yong shal not say, I am yong and vertuous, nor the olde shall not say, I 
am olde and broken. For of necessite, the drye flaxe wyll brenne in the fyre : 
and the grene flagge smoke in the flamme. I saye, that a man beynge a diamonds 
enchased amonge men, yet of necessitie he ought to be quycke and mery amonge 
women" (Cap. xxxvi). 

" Thou mayste well thinke what turment ought to be in the see of my harte, 
whan suche tremblynges and motions of erthe and reynes are set in the erthe of 
my body" (Cap. XLn). 

From The Diall of Princes : 

"More for the good merites that were in the children, then for the greate esti- 
macion that came from the fathers" (p. 2). 

" For good princes chose alway suche captaynes, as can by wysedome guide the 
armye, and with valiauntes give the bataile " (p. 2). 



48 The Prose Style of Richard RoUe of Hampole. 

' ' For his domes er so pryue, }>at na creature may comprehend )>am ; and of t- 
sithes som haues J^ar likyng & J>air wil in >is worlde, & hell in J^e toJ>er ; & som 
men er in pyne & persecucion & anguysch in J>is lyfe, & hase heuen to J?air mede " 
(p. 54). 

" Wharf ore, J'at Jjou may lufe hym trewly, vnderstand J>at his lufe es proued in 
thre thynges : In thynkyng, In spekyng, In wirkyng. Chaunge ^i thoght fra )>e 
worlde, & kast it haly on hym : & he sail norysche J>e. Chaunge J>i mowth fra 
vnnayte & warldes speche, & speke of hym : & he sail comforth )>e. Chaunge )>i 
hend fra J^e warkes of vanitese, & lyft Jjam in his name, & wyrke anly for hys 
lufe : & he sail receyue J>e " (p. 67). 

"If )>\ body be cled uyth-outen as Jjine order iwille, loke \>2ii \>\ sawle be noght 
naked with-in j^at >ine order forbedes : Bot naked be )>i sawle fra all vices, & warme 
happed in lufe and mekenes" (p. 68). 

"I prey )>e, lord, and byseke l^e J^at J'OU unbynde vs of bondys of alle owre 
synnys, os l^ou suffred to be bownde for owre loue" (p, 83). 

' ' I thanke \>& of he peynes and schamys J^at t>ou thorow J?i swete wylle sofEred 
for vs whan J^ou were clad in purpre for to schame )je, and )je corowne with thornys 
for to pyne with ]>i swete hed " (p. 84). 

' ' I thanke >e of peynes and of schamus J>at ^ou soffrede so swetely & so gladly, 
now for to drawe he, now for to putte \>e so schamely, now for to smyte J>e, now 
for to bete \>e so sore & so felly" (p. 84). 

' ' pe loue of gowre hertys >at ouer alle ojjere loues was wythowte make bren- 
nyng kene, made sow to brenne eyther for o>er with vnlyke sorewe to ony ot>er 
woo ; as J^e loue was makeles, so )>e sorewe was pereless" (p. 86). 

' ' A, lady, t-at sorewe may no tunge telle j?at J)0u here soffryd at hat ilke chawn- 

' ' For the Komaynes neither feared the paynes of hell, nor trusted for reward in 
heaven" (p. 2). 

" His death was as muche bewayled as his lyfe was desyred " (p. 2). 

" It is a rule that never faileth, that vertue, maketh a straunger grow natural, 
and vice, maketh the naturall a straunger in his countrye" (p. 3). 

". . . to forget the vices of Rome, and to accustome me, to the vertues of 
Ehodes" (p. 3). 

" O my frend Pulio it was such a joye then, to beholde the discipline and pros- 
perite of Kome, and it is now at this present suche a grefe to see the calamitie 
therof" (p. 4). 

"... for then amongst a thousande, they could not finde one man vicious in 
Eome : and now amonges twentie thousand, they cannot finde one vertuous in all 
Italye" (p. 4). 

" Universally the noble harte may endure al the travailes of man's life, unlesse 
it be, to see a good man decaye, and the wicked to prosper : which my harte can- 
not abyde, nor yet my tonge dissemble " (p. 4). 

' ' For of righte ought that common wealthe to be distroyed, whiche out of all 
other hathe bene the flower and moste beautified with vertues : and after becometh 
moste abhominable, and defiled, with vices" (p. 5). 

' ' For the example of the deade doe profyte good men more to live well : than 
the counsayle of the wicked provoketh the lyvinge to lyve evyll" (p. 5). 

"... a man which coulde reade it well, and also dispute of it better" (p. 5). 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Uampole. 49 

gynge : when hou in \>i sonys stede, J^i flesche and \>i blood, schulde aho)>er felow 
take : for almygty god a dedly man, decyple for }>e mayster, lohan for Ihesu 
Cryst" (p. 89). 

"My lord, is now J>e malyce of my lyther herte more J^an is \>e vertu of \>i 
precyoiise deth " (p. 90). 

"Swete Ihesu, in \>ee is al souereyn medicyn, & I, lord, am al siik in synnes" 
(p. 93). 

"More jit, swete Ihesu, \>i bodi is lijk a book writen wij> reed enke : so is \>i 
bodi al writen wi)? rede woundis. Now, swete Ihesu, graunte me grace often to 
rede upon )?is book, & sumwhat to vndirstonde \>e swetnes of J^at writinge, & to 
haue likinge in stodious abidinge of ]>at redinge" (p. 97). 

" Swete Ihesu, git \>i bodi is lijk to a mede ful of swete flouris & holsum herbis : 
so is \>i bodi ful of woundis, swete saueringe to a deuout soule, & holsum as eerbis 
to ech sinful man. Now, swete Ihesu, I biseche ]jee, graunte me swete sauor of 
merci, & \>e holsum reseite of grace" (p. 97). 

"And of alle J^is perils J>i gode god has delyuerid )>e of his godenes & noght of 
M dessert" (p. 145). 

"Men of religione heris lessons of hali mennis Ijaes at J>aire mete, so J>at as J>e 
bodi is fed with bodili fode : so \>e saule be fed with hali wordis" (p. 150). 

" And sai sum-tyme he vii psalmes for )>e quik & \>e dead, J>at god gif grace to 
>e quike : & rest to J>e dead" (p. 155). 

"pen, thorugh >e rightwisenes of god we are more worthi til haue payne for 
cure euil dedes ; )>en any mede of god for any gode l>at we doo " (p. 156). 

"Prayere prynttede and closede in a laghe herte with J^e lufuly drede of godd 
and with mylde mekenes, euer-mare dredande for to greue godd and euer-mare 
desyrande for to lufe godd, reues fra J>e songe Infers of godd lykynge and luste Jpat 
be aide Infers of godd before base loste" (p. 300). 

We conclude our specimens of sentence-structure with a few 
that are noteworthy for their parison/ 

1 "When we find two clauses or sentences conveying an antithesis, or a train of 
clauses or sentences connected by parallelism, we often find two, three, or all the 
words in the different members accurately balanced against each or one another by 
similarity of position and similarity of grammatical function. This is called 
parison. In cases of parisonic antithesis, the words opposed are themselves very 
generally contrary or opposite in meaning" (Child, p. 52). 

Bond I, 540, suggests the term "clause-parallelism" for this feature in Lyly's style. 

Cf. Professor Bright' s Eeview of Bond's The Complete Works of John Lyly, 
American Journal of Philology, xxv, p. 203: "Throughout his discussion of 
Euphuism, moreover, Mr. Bond has prepared the reader for what would otherwise 
have been a real surprise in his note on 'parison ' (1, 540). The ancient use of 
the word (Quintilian, ix, iii, 75) should have saved Mr. Bond from an habitual 
playing with the mistaken etymological significance of the term ; indeed the 
modern glass-blower might have taught him better. There is, however, an objec- 
tion that might be urged against the use of 'parison' (adjective) in place of the 
correctly formed name of the process, ' pariosis ' ( Volkmann, ' Rhetorik ' p. 482 ; 
Gerber, 'Die Sprache als Kunst' n, 135, 140). The old word cancels the demand 
for such an unshapely coin as 'clause-parallelism.' " 



50 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 

' ' pe tliyrd es : >e wonderfull ioy of >e kyngdom of heuen, J>at es mare J>an tong 
may tell, or hert mai tliyak, or egli may se, or ere may here. It es swa mykel, 
J'at, als in hel myglit na thyng lyue for niykel pyne, hot at J^e myght of god suffers 
J>am noght to dye : swa t>e ioy in i>e syght of Iliesu in liis godhede es swa mykel. 
J>at ]>ai mond dye for ioy, if it ne war his godenes, hat will l^at liis loners be lyuand 
ay in blys : als his ryghtwysnes wil hat al \>a,t lufed hym noght, be ay lyuand in 
fyre, j^at es horribel till any man at thynk, loke hen what it es to fele" (p. 28). 

"And loke wele \>at hou seme not ane with-owten, and be a nother wyth-in, als 
ypocrites dose, he whilk er like til a sepulker J>at es paynted richely with-owten, 
& wyth-in rotes stynkand banes. ^ If hou have delyte in J>e name of religion : loke 
hat hou have mare delyte in he dede hat falles til religion. Thyne abett says hat 
hou base forsaken he world, hat hou ert gyuen til goddes seruys, hat hou delytes he 
noght in erthly thyng : lok han hat it be in hi hert, als it semes in men syght — For 
na thyng may make he religious hot vertues & clennes of sawle in charite. 

"If hi body be cled wyth-owten as hine order wille, loke hat hi sawle be noght 
naked with-in — hat hine order forbedes : Bot naked be hi sawle fra all vices, & 
warme happed in lufe and mekenes" (p. 68). 

"Sothely, swa dose al he lofers har-of : For nathyng may stande stabely on a 
fals gronde. pair bodys er gyn til wormes in erth, & haix sawles til he deuels of 
hell. Bot all hat forsoke he pompe & he vanite of his lyfe, & stode stalworthly 
agaynes all temptacions, and ended in he lufe of god : hai ar now in ioy, & base 
he erytage of heuen, har to won with-owten end, restand in he delyces of goddes 
syght" (p. 70). 

' ' Lord hat aligtist fro lieuene to erthe for loue of mankynde, from so hig to so 
low, from so hig loi'dschip to so low pouert, from so hig noblei to so lowe myscheef, 
from so hig wele to so lowg wo, from so hig blis to so lowg peyne, from so hig 
myrhe to so lowg sorewe, from so likinge a liif to so peyneful a deeh" (p. 92). 

"panne was hi bodi lijk to heuene : for as heuene is ful of sterris, so is hi bodi 
ful of woundis. But, lord, hi woundis ben betere han sterris : for sterris schinen 
not but hi nygtis, & hi woundis ben ful of vertu nygt & day ; alle he sterris hi 
nygte ne ligten but a litel, & o cloude may hide hem alle ; but oon of hi woundis, 
swete Ihesu, was & is Inoug, to do awey cloudis of synne, and to clere he con- 
science of alle sinful men " (p. 96 ) . 

"A, swete Ihesu, hei gauen hee poisoun to kele hi hrist wih : & hou gaue hem 
hin herte blood to quenche her synnes, & to hele her soulis " (p. 101). 

' ' perfor ilk man aske of god with drede : hat he askis, & prai his lauerd if he 

1 Cf. Matthew, xxiii, 27. 

For a passage of somewhat similar antithetical form, inspired by the same biblical 
quotation, cf . The Ayenhite of Inwyt, p. 228 : " ' O. ' zayh he ' huet is uayr chastete 
kenrede mid bri^tnesse.' he zet rigt wel brigtnesse mid chastete. uor hanne is 
uayr chastete and maydenhod huanne hi is brigt be guode liue and oneste. Ase 
he brigtnesse of he zonne makeh hane uayre day : alsuo he brigtnesse of grace and 
of guode liue : makeh he maydenhod uayr and likinde to god. Huerof saynt 
lerome zayh het mochel is uayr and brigt to-uore he ohre uirtues maydenhod. 
huanne hi is wyhoute lac and wyhoute uelhe of zenne. Vor huo het is yhol of 
bodie and uoul ine herte : is ase he berieles yhuited het is uayr wyh-oute : and 
wyh-inne uol of stench. ' ' 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 61 

see }pa.t his praier be nedeful & skilful : pat he it fulfill ; & if it ne be nedeful ne 
skilful : J^at he it withdrawe ; for what mai help & what (mai ) harme : wate better 
l^e leche J>en )>e seke" (p. 143). 

' ' Some- while it fallis J^at he is better in goddis dome J>at man demes iuel : hen 
some bat man demes gode. Mani are honest withoute : & vnclene with- in ; Some 
werldli & dissolute : & hali with-in as goddis priue frendes. And some beris haim 
in mannis sight as angels, & in goddes sight ^ai stynk as synful wrechis ; And 
some semes synful til mannes dome : & are ful dere til god almighti, for J^aire 
indre berynge : is heuenli in goddis bright sight " (p. 153). 

" Bot J)e Infers of J>e werlde & of J>aire awene luste gettis neuer J?e mare bot ]f>e 
lesse for swilke vayne styrrynge, ne t>e Infers of godd gettis neuer J>e lesse bot ]>e 
mare for l^aire meke thynkynge" (p. 299). 

' ' For as be herte bat es ^ufely /estenede in be Ivde of godd /orgettis all be /uste 
and fykynge of be/lesche, righte swa bat herte bat es /estenede in laste and /ykynge 
of be /lesche _^or-getes all /ufe and fykynge bat it sulde hafe in godd" (p. 299). 

Frequent use of such forms is liable to make any prose appear 
disconnected ; for it leaves the impression that the entire thought 
was expended on the construction of the single sentences without 
due regard for the larger unities. Horstman is a little prone to 
speak of Rolle's laxity of plan, of this rambling, loose construction. 
Close reading shows that the charges are true only if they refer to 
the treatises as a whole, and even then they deserve to be modified. 
The sense of looseness is caused by Rolle's habit, as it were, of 
playing with his thought. His mind was restless, quick to note 
the significant word around which to build a new thought. Child 
shows (p. 47) why it is that Lyly's prose was often misjudged. 
The same reason may well be applied to explain Rolle's apparent 
looseness : " Each thought with its suggestions is so long dwelt 
upon and the similes, metaphors and illustrations which accom- 
pany it are so varied and attract so much attention, that except 
one read with close attention, the eifect is that of a rambling and 
disconnected discourse." In spite of his peculiar restless style 
many of Rolle's sections when considered separately, show decided 
skill in their formation, giving plain evidence how their unity was 
preserved. This feature has a faint resemblance to one apparent 
in Euphustic prose, but there it has the dignity of method, so con- 
sistently applied that the unity of the entire discourse is assured. 
Child (p. 46) says of Lyly, " a single thought occupies his atten- 
tion for some time ; he balances with it its allied thoughts, directs 
his efforts to express it and its suggestions in a variety of ways, 



52 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampote. 

and to emphasize these by illustration and example, before he 
passes to the next thought in the logical sequence. Unity is 
brought about through parallelism." 

A section from Rolle's Form of Perfect Living (Horstman i, 
39), will show what resemblance he bears in this respect to Lyly : 

" pe thirde askyng es : "How sal I verrayli lufe god?" I answer : Verray 
lufe es : to lufe hym in al )>i myght, stalwortly ; In al J>i hert, wysely ; In al \>i 
sawle, deuowtely & swetely. Stalwortly may na man lufe hym, bot he be stal- 
worth. He es stalworth J>at es meke, for al gastly strengh comes of mekenes ; — 
on whame restes \>e haly gaste ? in a meke sawle. Mekenes gouernes us & kepes 
us in al oure temptacions, swa }>at j^ai ouercom us noght. Bot \>e deuel deceyues 
many Jjat er meke thorow tribulacions, & reproues, & bakebitynges. Bot if Jjou 
be wrath for any anguys of }jis worlde, or for any worde Jjat men says of >e, or for 
oght )>at men says til )>e : J^ou ert noght meke, ne hou may swa lufe god stalwortly. 
For luf es stalworth als he dede, })at slaes al lyuand thyng in erth ; and hard a Is 
hell, }?at spares noght till J^am J^at er dede. And he J^at lufes god perfitely he 
greues hym noght, what schame or angwys t>at he suffers, bot he has delyte, & 
couaytes t>at he war worthy forto suffer torment & payne for Crystes lufe ; and he 
hase joy >at men reproues hym & spekes ill of hym. Als a dede man, what sa 
men dos or sayes, he answers noght : Ryght swa, wha sa lufes god perfitely, >ai er 
not stirred for any worde >at man may say. For he or scho kan noght lufe )>at 
may noght suffer payne & anger for }>air friendes lufe. For wha sa lufes }>ai haue 
na pryde. Prowde men or women lufes noght stalworthly : for J>ai er swa 
wayke, )>at J>ai fall at ilk a styryng of ]>e wynde, J>at es temptacion. pai seke 
heghar stede J>an Cryste : for )?ai wil haue hair wil done, whethir it be with right 
or with wrang : and Cryst will nathyng be done bot wele, & with-outen harme of 
othir men. Bot wha sa es verrayly meke, hai wil noght haue hair wil in his worlde, 
bot hat hai may haue it in he toher plenarly. In na thyng may men sonar ouer- 
com he duel, han in Mekenes, hat he mykel hates. For he may wake & faste, & 
suffer pyne, mare han any otlier creature may : Bot mekenes & lufe may he noght 
haue. Alswa he behoues luf god wysely : and hat may hou noght do bot if hou be 
wyse. hou ert wyse ... ." 

This extract from Rolle may be compared with the following 
typical one from the Diall of Princes (Cap. xx), to show that a 
similar method of sustaining interest was employed by North : ^ 

* ' In myne opinion Princes ought, and are bounde to be vertuous, for 5 causes. 
I say vertuous, in that they should love and feare god. For he onely may be 
called vertuous, which in the catholyke faith of the church, and in the feare of 
god hathe alwaies remained constant. First, Princes should feare, love, serve, 
and honour one onely god, whom they worshippe, for that they acknowlege hym 
onely, and none other to be the heade, both of heaven and earth. For in the end, 

^ For the same stylistic peculiarity in Berners, cf . e. g. Cap. xv of The Golden 
boke of Marcus Aurelius. 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 53 

ther is nothing so puissaunt, but is subjecte to the divyne power. And truly, the 
Prince is in great peryll of damnacion of his soule, if in liys government, he hath 
not alwayes before his eies, the feare and love of the supreme prince, to whom we 
must render of all cure doinges an accompt. For the prince hath great occasion 
to be vicious, thincking that for the vice he shal not be chastised. I have redde 
in diverse and sondry writinges, and I never founde one auncient Prynce to be 
contented with one onely god, but that they had and served many gods. Julius 
Cesar caried five gods painted in a table, and Scipio the great caried seven portered 
in mettal. And furthermore, they were not contented to have many : but yet in 
sacrifices and services they offered unto them al. The christian Prynces, whiche 
keape and have but one very true and omnipotent god, are so unthankful, that 
they thinke it much to serve and give acceptable service unto him. And thoughe 
peradventure some saye that it is more payneful to serve one true god, then all 
these false gods, to this I aunswere : That to serve them, it is both trauaile, and 
payne : but to serve our god, it is both joye and felicity. For in serving those, it 
is costlye, and withoute profyte : and in servinge god, greate profite ensueth. For 
those goddes require great and riche sacrifices : and our god demandeth nothinge 
but pure and cleane hartes. ' ' 

Since the style of Richard Rolle, in its employment of anti- 
thesis, has so much in common with that of Lyly and the Euphu- 
ists, it remains to indicate what was the probable line of influence 
which occasioned the likeness in prose so widely separated and 
essentially dissimilar. To do so it will be necessary, first, to quote 
rather extensively from Norden, who gave especial attention to the 
origin of the feature in Euphuism ; then, by referring to special 
studies in Rolle's sources to see if our knowledge of the reading of 
Rolle gives enough ground to assume that the agreement between 
Rolle and the Euphuists in this stylistic feature, was due to the 
same general cause, the direct and indirect imitation of classic 
models. 

Assuming that the immediate source of Euphuism lies in the 
work of Guevara, El libra de Marco Aurelio, Norden attempts to 
show where the Spaniard found the models for his antithetical 
sentence form, by common consent of all critics from Drake down, 
the most characteristic feature of Euphuism.^ He says (vol. ii, p. 

'Cf. Landmann in "Transactions of the New Shakespeare Society,^' 1880-85, pt. 
II, p. 253 : 

"The most prominent characteristic of Guevara's style is the parallelism of 
sentences, parisonic antithesis, well balanced juxta or contra-position of words 
and clauses ; and he has a predilection for pointing out the corresponding words 
by consonance or rhyme. There is no chapter in Guevara's books where these 



54 The Prose Style of RicJiard Rolle of Hampole. 

789), "Aber ich, dem das Englische uebensachlich war, fragte 
weiter : woher hat dieseu Stil der Spanier ? Die Antwort ergab 
sich mir sofort cUeser Antithesenstil oder, was dasselbe ist, dieser 
Satzparallelismus Icann nur cine der vielen Erscheinungsformen jenes 
alien gorgianischen axrjfjia sein, dessen tandelnde, auf Ohr imd 
Auge siunlich wirkende Art seit zwei Jahrtaiisenden auf Meuschen 
verschiedenste Zunge seine Wirkiing ausiibte und zur Nachahmung 
reizte." Norden next endeavors to discover, if possible, what were 
the training and reading of Guevara in order to learn if he was 
influenced by the Humanistic trend of the period, then to see if, in 
the theory and practice of the contemporary Humanists, there was 
an especial fondness for the use of antithesis. Satisfied on both 

twin phrases do not at once strike the eye ; they form the most prominent feature 
in Guevara's and Lyly's style." 

Cf . Joseph Jacobs, The earliest English version of the Fables of Bidpai, ' ' The 
Morall Philosophie of Doni, ' ' by Sir Thomas North, whilom of Peterhouse, Cambridge, 
edited and induced, London, 1888, pp. liii-liv : 

"Yet, if recent research is to be trusted, North's first book, the translation of 
Guevara, which he called The Dial of Princes, had almost as much influence as 
his Plutarch. For Dr. Landmann in an ingenious essay {Der Euphuis^nus, Gies- 
sen, 1881) has attempted to trace Euphuism to the influence of Guevara. It is 
true Mr. S. L. Lee interprets this to mean that Euphuism had for its literary 
parent Lord Berners, the translator of Froissart, who also Englished Guevara's 
book before North in 1539 (see his edition of Berner's Huon of Burdeux, E. E. T. 
S. E. S., 50, pt. IV, pp. 785-6). But Berner's version was made from the 
French, and it is diflScult to see how the Spaniard's style could be caught except 
in a version made from the Spanish, as was in large measure that of North, who 
must therefore be regarded as the father of Euphuism, if that style is to be traced 
to Guevara alone. But as a matter of fact, such a tendency to over-ornamentation 
as is shown in Euphuism came to all the literatures of West Europe as a natui'al 
development after they had passed the apprenticeship of translation, and became 
conscious of the delights of literary artifice. 

North came just mid-way between the exaggerated Ciceronianism of Berners, 
Elliott, and Ascham, his chief predecessors, and the exaggerated Guevarism (if 
it must be so ) of Lyly and his school ; and because he did so, we see in him Tudor 
prose at its best. ' ' 

A comparison made between the two translations, the first of the original and 
the second of the greatly expanded work of Guevara, — Berner's Golden boJce, 1534, 
and North's Diall, 1557, found chapters in North's version almost identically the 
same as chapters in that of Berners. Compare e. g., cap. xxxviii of the Golden 
boke with cap. LXiii of the Dicdl. The style of Berners is essentially Euphuism. 
The artificialities that mark the prose of Lyly are used by Berners, though not 
so freely or so consistently. 



The Prose Style of Rlchav'd Bolle of Hampole. 55 

points Norden concludes that in Guevara's style we have one of 
the many results of the Renaissance. 

For proof of the existence and activity of Humanism in Spain, 
Norden is compelled to go to the catalogues of Andreas Schottus, 
Hispaniae bibllotheca, Frankfort, 1608, and of Nic. Antonio, 
BlbliotlieGa Hispana, Rome, 1672. From these catalogues he 
selects the list of books owned by three of the more prominent 
Humanists, Lud. Vives, Alphonso Garsias Matamoro, Francisc. 
Sanctius, and concludes (vol. ii, p. 790), " Liest man die Werke 
der beiden ersten und sammelt sich aus den genanuten Katalogen 
die stattliche Reihe der Humanisten so erkennt man, dass die 
formalistiche Renaissancerhetorik seit dem Ausgang des xv Jh. in 
Spanien eine ausserordentlich grosse Rolle spielte, was ja bei dem 
stark ausgepnigten oratorischen Naturell dieses Volkes audi 
begreiflich genug ist." The work of the Spaniards, however, was 
not remarkable for originality, but owed much to the efforts of the 
Italian scholars of the period. 

That Guevara was trained in the schools and methods of 
Humanism, Norden thinks plainly evident from the contents of 
the Libro Aureo as well as from its style, and since it is in 
Guevara's style that Norden's chief interest rests, he goes further 
to establish the proof of classical influence upon Guevara. Of this 
influence, Norden finds satisfying proof in Guevara's epitaph, the 
only accessible Latin written by him, and in contemporary opinions 
on his style. For its effect on the writers of the time, there is 
both praise and censure. In general, the criticisms quoted by 
Norden call attention to Guevara's florid style, with its fondness 
for unusual words, learned allusions to classical lore and abun- 
dance of balance and antithesis. To this argument of Norden's 
we add one of decided value from Wendelstein, which, based on 
Guevara's own words, suggests other sources for his main stylistic 
feature. He says (p. 67), " Antithese und Satzparallelismus sug- 
gerierte gewiss auch die Bibel. Sie war ohne Zweifel teilweise 
auch die Leherin Guevara's. Man darf das seinen eigenen 
Worten entnehmen : ' Ich habe mich in dieser Schrift (i, e. Libro 
aureo), die weltlichen Charakter hat, des Mittels bedient, dessen 
man sich verschiedene Male in der Theologie bediente.' Mit mehr 



56 The Prose Style of Ricliard Rolls of Hampole. 

Recht regen diese Worte einen andern Gedanken vielleicht an. 
Der hervorragende Theologe hatte gewiss eine eingehende Kennt- 
nis der Kirchenvater. Charakteristiscli fiir den Stil dieser ist 
antithetischer Satzparallelismus mit Homoioteleuton. An diese 
friihmittelalterlichen Kirchenschriftsteller hat wohl Guevara mit 
seinen Worten betreifend die besondere Beachtuug des Satzgefiiges 
gedacht und von ihnen hat er ohne Zweifel viel gelernt fiir seinen 
' erhabenen Stil.' " 

In conclusion, we may assume from the arguments presented 
that the line of influence which made antithesis so prominent a 
feature in Euphuism was, in general, the following : 

The Bible, the Classics (i. e., Isocrates and Cicero), > Gue- 
vara > Lyly and his immediate forerunners, Berners, North, Pettie. 

Though the question of Richard Rolle's sources is still unsettled, 
it has been shown ^ that he knew, directly or indirectly, the fol- 
lowing authors or works : 

L. An. Seneca, Disticha Catonis, Augustine, Pseudo Augus- 
tine, Vitae Patrum, Gregorius Magnus, Isidorus, Adso, L. Ansel- 
mus, Eadmer, Hilderbertus Turonensis, Hugo v. S. Victor, St. 
Bernardus, Petrus Lombardus, Honorius Augustotunensis, Petrus 
Blessensis, Innocent III, Philippe de Greve, Csesarius Heister- 
bacensis, S. Edmundus, Bartholomseus Anglicus, Sidrac, Compend 
theologice veritatis, Abundantia exemplorum, Signa mortis, As- 
sumptio Marise, Encomium nominis Jesu. 

To this list we add Cicero, for the evidence found in Rolle's 
Incendio Amoris, that he was influenced by at least one work of 
Cicero, the De Amicitia, is irrefutable. A distinguishing mark of 
the style of Cicero and of Seneca is antithesis, which is likewise 
that of the Church Latin, and notably so of St. Augustine. To 
the direct influence of the early, artificial Church Latin we must 
add that of the later period, as it is found in such works as The 
Mirror of St. Edmund ^ and Petrus Bleseusis' The Twelve Profits of 
Tribulation,^ which, replete in antithesis, had doubtless undergone 

1 Cf. Hahn, p. 46. 
^Cf. Horstman, i, p. 219. 
^ Ibid. II, p. 45. 

Likewise notable for its striking sentence forms is Richard de S. Victore's 
Benjamin Minor, Horstman I, pp. 162-172. We add a few specimens : 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 57 

its own refining process by following patristic models of sentence 
structure. Although Kourath ^ questions Horstman's assertion 
that E,olle translated these treatises, he gives no reason for his 
opinion. Hahn (p. 46), because he finds so few echoes of them 
in Rolle's work, agrees with Konrath. Neither opinion should 
carry much weight, for we may always assume that a man of 
RoUe's predilections knew both treatises, and especially St. 
Edmund, the chief of mystics. 

Inasmuch as Richard Rolle was almost wholly schooled in the 
Bible and the Church Fathers, his style, in its conscious use of 
antithesis, may well be considered anticipatory of Euphuism.^ It 
is obvious that we have in this early writer an example of the way 
in which artificial sentence forms are brought into a language. In 
almost precisely the same way Lyly and his circle found the models 
of their characteristic sentence form. From the Church Fathers 
Rolle learned what the Fathers had learned from the classics ; in 
like manner, Lyly and his forerunners borrowed from Guevara 
what Guevara had learned from the classics and the artificial Latin 
of the Church. 

' ' t>e ton is reson, }>e tojjer is aflecion : thorow reson we knawe, and thorow 
afifecion we lufe. Of reson sprynges ryghtwise consales & gastele wittes, of 

affeccion sprynges hole desires & ordaynde felynges with-outen ymagin- 

acion reson may noght know, and withouton sensualite affeccion may noght fele. ' ' 

"begynes J^en trule to se gode be felyng of drede, & also to be sen of gode be 
rewardyng of pyte." 

" For ay i>e mor man dredes J>e paynes J^at he has rfeserwede, J>e bytterlier he 
sorose ]>e syne J>at he has done." 

" For it/als to a per/'ite saule [both] to be en/la wmede with >e/ire of Zuf in \>e 
a^eccion, & also to be illnmjnde with tyght of knawyng in \>e reson. ' ' 

^ Herrig's Archiv, xcix, p. 161. 

^ ' ' The acquirement on the part of a people of its rhetorical forms might worthily 
be made subject of inquiry. Clearly with the Euphuists arose the constant and 
understanding use of antithesis and parallelism. Before their time there is no 
marked indication of a persistent tendency to the use of these devices in prose ; 
prose literature consisted either of simple narrative, or of works of polity, theol- 
ogy, instruction, made up substantially of straightforward assertion with occasional 
simple arguments from example and analogy. The classics taught Guevara and 
were teaching England — and doubtless the Bible, with its wonderful oriental use 
of these forms, would have lent its aid. But as it was, Guevara's example taught 
the Euphuist, and the Euphuist i. e. Pettie, first made their constant use a prin- 
ciple. Surely this is noteworthy when we consider how important a feature they 
are of English prose style." Child, p. 113. 



58 



The Prose Style of Eichard Rolle of Hampole. 



III. RICHARD ROLLE AND CICERO. 

Proof that Richard Rolle knew and was influenced by at least 
one work of Cicero is found in his Incendium Ainoris, which was 
translated by Richard Misyn in 1435 under the title, The Fire 
of Love} 

In this work, Book ii, Chapter ix, treats : "Of diuers ffrenschips 
of gude & ille &' as it may be lawsyd ; of scarisnes & of frenschip 
of men & wymmen, & of trew frenschip & how chosyn in itt in 
)?is lyflPe loys & of foly of sinne ]>at abstene to mikylle, or ar nakyd, 
& of fleschly frenschip, & aray of men & wymmen." A passage 
in the Euphues also has friendship as its theme, but Lyly's treat- 
ment is not so full as that of Rolle's. Some striking thoughts and 
phrases of the Euphues section are traced by Bond (vol. i, p. 334) 
to their obvious source, the De Amleitia. The section in the Fire 
of Love reveals the decided similarity existing between the two 
treatments. It establishes unmistakably the fact that Rolle received 
his inspiration, in part at least, from the same sources that gave 
the Euphuists the models for their most striking stylistic feature, 
the fondness for balance and antithesis. That Rolle was keenly 
appreciative of the beauty and value of these artificial sentence 
forms will be granted from the showing of examples already pre- 
sented. It is gratifying to see that he learned much of their 
construction from Cicero as well as from his favorite Church 
Fathers. The following table will illustrate the extent of his 
borrowings from the tract by Cicero : 



Cicero.^ 

"Est enim amicitia nihil aliud nisi 
omnium divinarum humanarumque re- 
rum cum benevolentia et caritate con- 
sensio " (p. 8, 1. 24). 



EoiiLE. 

' ' Frenschyp is knytynge of two wyllis 
to lyke Jjinges consentynge & to vnlyke 
dissentyng" (p. 90, 1. 35).=' 



iR E. T. S., 106. 

^ References are to J. W. Reid, Cicero de Amicitia, American Edition by F. W. 
Kelsey, Boston, 1889. 

' Doth not the sympathy of manners, make the coniunction of mindes ? Is it 
not a by woord, like will to like?" (Bond, i, p. 197). 



The Prose Style of Richard JRolle of Hampole. 59 



Cicero. 

' ' Verum etiam amicum qui intuetur, 
tamqiiam exemplar aliquod intuetur sui. 
Quocirca et absentes adsunt et egentes 
abundant et imbecilli valent et quod 
difficilius dictu est, mortui vivunt . . ." 
(p. 10, 1. 3). 



" Verum etiam amicum qui intuetur 
tamquam exemplar aliquod intuetur 
sui .... " (p. 10, 1. 3). 

" ut eodem modo erga amicum affecti 
simus quo erga nosmet ipsos . . . . " 
(p. 22, 1. 13). 

"ipse enim se quisque diligit, non 
ut aliquam a se ipse mercedem exigat 
caritatis suae, sed quod per se quisque 
sibi carus est ; quod nisi idem in amici- 
tiam transferetur, verus amicus num- 
quam reperietur : est enim is, (jui est 
tamquam alter idem " (p. 30, 1. 18). 

"Sed hoc primum sentio, nisi in 
bonis amicitiara esse non posse . . . . " 
(p. 7, 1. 24). 

' ' amicitiam nisi inter bonos esse non 
posse" (p. 25, 1. 31). 

"Sed plerique neque in rebus hu- 
manis quicquam bonum norunt nisi 
quod fructuosum sit, et amicos tam- 
quam pecudes eos potissimum diligunt, 
ex quibus sperant se maximum fructum 
esse capturos" (p. 30, 1. 11). 



" Quam ob rem id primum videamus, 
si placet, quatenus amor in amicitia 
progredi debeat. Numne, si Q»riolanus 



KoLIiE. 

' ' In mennys desyrs qwer is tru f ren- 
schyp ? god forbede l>at bodily sondyrans 
make partynge of sawlis, bot rather )>e 
knot vnlousyd of drawynge frenschyp 
sal comforth heuynes of bodily sondyr- 
ynge, ]>a,t \>e freynd with his freynd sail 
)>ink he is, qhwils he seys stedfanes of 
wills vnlowysd (p. 91, 1. 4).^ 

It is certan trw frenschyp qwhen a 
freynd behauys hym to his frende als to 
hym-self qwhen he J>inkis his freynd 
hym-self in a-nodyr body, & his freynd 
he lufis for hymself, not for profett J^at 
he trowys of hym to haue (p. 91, 
1. 8).^ 

' ' I wote not soythelye be qwhat vnhap 
now is fallyn l^at vnneyth or seldom is 
fun a trew freynde ; ilkone his awen 
sekys & no man has a frende of qwhome 
he says he is my-self in a-nodyr body ; 
)>a bow to \>er awen profett & likyngis, 
& gyl to fulfyll in \>er f rendys ha schame 
nott" (p. 92, 1. 15). 

" Sum says frenschyp is not parfytte 
bot if it be betwyx l>ame l>at ar lyke in 
vertewe" (p. 91, 1. 13). 



" Sum says ... }>at is agayns re- 
sone qwhere a man is lufyd for hym- 
self, not for profett or lyknge" (p. 91, 
1. 16). 

' ' perof is demyd t>at J»a trew f rendys 
ar not, bot fenyd, for |>e men |>ai lufe 
nott bot owdyr \>er gude l»a couet or to 
fals flatering & fauyr >a tent" (p. 92, 
1. 19). 

' ' Bot it is askyd, if \>e tone f reend 
erre qwhedyr sail frenschyp sees? . . . 
In frendys sothely is it nogt necessary 



' Cf . " such friends with whom they may seeme beeing absent to be present, 
being a sunder to be conuersant, beeing dead to be aliue " {Ibid., p. 197). 

^ Cf . " at all times an other I, in all places ye expresse I mage of mine owne 
person ? . . . . I will therefore haue Philautus for my pheere, ... by how 
much the more I view in him the liuely Image of Euphues " {Ibid., p. 197). 



60 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 



Cicero. 

habuit amicos, ferre contra patriam arma 
illi cum Coriolano debuerunt?" (p. 15, 
1. 15). "nam, cum conciliatrix ami- 
citiae virtutis opinio fuerit, difficile est 
amicitiam manere, si a virtute defece- 
ris" (p. 16, 1. 4). 



EOLIiE. 

)>e tone be chaungyd for chaungynge of 
)>aX toJ>er, bot frenschyp, sene it is ver- 
tew, impossibyll it is )>at it be voydyd 
in any man with-out his chaung}'ng" 
(p. 91, 1. 11).' 



In their tone and spirit, some passages are decidedly suggestive 
of readings in the Cicero tract, though no particular parts stand 
out as sources : 

" Kynde truly gars a man seyk hym a trew frende, for kynde desyrs kyndenes & 
fayth to kepe, & itt wyrkis no-l^inge in vayne ; qwarfore \>^i frenschyp }jat is 
kyndely sal not be lausyd, kynde lastyng, bot if it be into grete wronge of kynde, 
Jjat lufyd kynde gaynstand, & J>at may kynde o no wyse do, bot if it be oppressyd 
with rotyn maners. Ffrenschyp >erfore J^at any t>inge kyndyls )>at is not )je same 
l^at is lufyd, slakis & is slokynde qwen >at binge )>at stirryd Jpc lufe is not had, as 
if maners or riches or fayrnes frenschyp be had with yll maners, riches scri}>inge, 
fayrnes wastyd, frenschyp alsso vanyschys & of hym t>at it had is sayde no-)>inge 
vnhappiar J>en to be happy. Bot ffrenschyp J>at kynde wyrkis in frendys, with 
no pouert is cast owt, with non errour done away, with none fowlnes of body is 
endyd qwhilst kynde lastys >at is cause of )>is frenschip . . . Tru frenschyp may 
not be without likynge be-twyx frendys & jjaire desirefull speych & comfortabyll 
chere" (p. 91, 1. 34). 

From another chapter we quote a passage of similar turn : 

" Presens of my lufe to me gettis gladnes un-mesurde & sikyrnes, & of heuynes 
with hym I haue no mynde ; all aduersite vanyschis & all o\>ev desyres aperis not, 
bot ha ar stillyd & disparischyd, & he allone me holly refreschys & inlappis J>at 
my mynde allone byrnyngly has desiryd" (p. 100, 1. 19). 



^ Cf. Contemplations of the dread and love of God, Horstman ii, p. 81 : 
"The fourth poynte is thou shalt loue thy frende for his good lyuynge. 
Yf, thou haue a frende that is of good lyuynge thou shalt loue hym in double 
maner for he is thy frende, and for the goodnes that is in hym ; yf he be not good 
of lyfe but vycyous thou mayst loue hym but not his vyces. For as I rede parfyte 
frendshyp is whan thou louest not in thy frende that sholde not be loued and 
whan thou louest in hym or desyrest to hym goodnes whiche is to be loued. As 
thus : though it be so that thy frende lyueth folysshly thou shalt not loue liym for 
his foly lyuynge but that he may by goddes grace amende hym and be parfyte in 
lyuynge. For what man it be that loueth hymselfe in folye he shal- not prouffyte 
in wysedom. Also the same clerke sayth in an other place : Loueth not the vyces 
of your frendes yf ye loue your frendes ..." 

According to marginal notes in the manuscripts, portions of the above extract 
find their source in Augustine. The influence of Cicero is obvious. 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 61 



" yet whosoeuer shall see this amitie 
grounded upon a little affection, will 
soone coniecture that it shall be dissolued 
upon a light occasion " (Bond, i, 197). 



The following specimen is particularly striking when compared 
with one, equally suggestive of Cicero, taken from the Euphues : 

" Ffrenschyp cerkin lyghtlye is lousy d 
qwhen in />e frendes ar not June qwharfor 
he svld be lufyd, \>at is to say qwhene 
frenschyp is not profetabyll ne lykand 
for qwhylk freyndis now ar lufyd, & 
slike frenschyp is fenyd, for it may not 
last hot qwhilste lust & profett bydis^' (p. 
91, 1. 24). 

Bond, in his note to this sentence from the Euphues places its 
source in Pettie, " The friendshyp amongest men is grounded upon 
no law, and dissolued upon very light occasion." From the above 
parallel, however, we think the ultimate source lies in Cicero, of 
whom the entire context in the Euphues is reminiscent. 

From the list of correspondences presented it may with safety 

be asserted that Richard Rolle used the treatise of Cicero in much 

the same manner as the trained Lyly, — borrowing and adapting 

thoughts without giving a hint as to their origin. The Classics 

had long been considered as ancilla Theologlae, not to be studied 

for their own worth or for what they might contribute to culture, 

but for what they could give in the way of help in spreading 

biblical and ecclesiastical teaching. Norden (vol. ii, p. 679) 

quotes from the second book of Augustin's De dodrina Christiana, 

" Wie die Agyptier nicht bloss Gotzenbilder hatten, die das Volk 

Israel verabscheute, sondern auch Gefiise, goldene und silberne, 

Schmucksachen und Gewander, die jenes Volk bei seinem Auszug 

aus Agypten fiir sich selbst gewissermassen zu einem bessern 

Gebrauch heimlich in Anspruch nahm (und zwar nicht aus eigner 

Machtvollkommenheit, sondern auf Befehl Gottes, indem die 

Agyptier, ohne es zu wissen, dasjenige ihnen liehen, von dem sie 

selbst keinen guten Gebrauch machten) : also enthalten die Lehren 

der Heiden nicht bloss falsche und aberglaubische Erdichtungen 

und iibei-fliissigen Ballast, sondern auch die zum Dienst der 

Wahrheit passenderen freien Kiinste (Uberales disciplinas) und 

einige ausserst niitzliche Moralvorschriften, ja in betreff der 

Verehrung des einen Gottes findet sich bei ihnen einiges Wahre. 

Dieses, also gewissermassen ihr Gold und Silber, muss der Christ 



6i 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 



ihnen entwenden, urn es in gerechter Weise bei der Verkundigung des 
Evangeliwms zu gebrauchen auch ihre Gewiinder .... darf er in 
Empfang nehmen, iind fiir den christlichen Gebrauch halten." 
Richard Rolle's method may be due to this teaching. If so, the 
pious resolve to borrow silver and gold vessels, brought him into 
a field so rich in that which would greatly elevate his style. That 
his Latin in the Incendvum Amoris is imitative of what marks 
both Church and Classical Latin, namely, the fondness for antith- 
esis, is shown by the readiness with which so many sentences fall 
into antithesis and balance when translated. The general tone of 
Misyn's work shows how slavishly he translated. A few sentences 
will make this clear : 



" Erassem utique : si aliter egissem ; 
sed non ignoraui a quo accepi ; unde 
conformaui omnino ut eius perficerem 
voluntatem, ne ingrato aufFerret quod 
gratis largiebatur. Delectabar itaque 
in solitudine sedere : ut extra tumultum 
positus liquidius canerem, et feruentibus 
precordiis meis suauissimam Jubila- 
cionem experirer quod ipsam sine am- 
biguitate de munere ipsius quern super 
omnia inestimabiliter amaui, accepis- 
sem" (Horstman ii, p. 65). 



" Arrid forsojj I had & I o)>er wyes 
had done, but wele I knew of qwhome 
I toke. perfore me all-way I ha con- 
fermyd his will to do, )>at fro me vnkynd 
he take not )>at kyndely to me he gaf. 
Grete lykynge I had in wildyrness to 
sytt, Jjat I far froo noys swetlyar mote 
synge & with qwhyknes of hart likyn- 
geste louynge I mote fayll, )»e qwhilke 
doutles of his gyft I ha takyn, qwhome 
abown al Ijinge wonderfully I ha lufyd ' ' 
(E. E. T. S. 106, p. 73, 1. 28). 



The following characteristic sentences in Misyn's translation 
will further illustrate the tendency toward balance and antithesis 
in Richard RoUe's Latin Prose : 

"Certanly als cristis lufars behavys t)am-self agayns \>e warld & J>e flesch, so 
luffars of }>e warlde behavys J>anie-self agayns god & >er awen saule " (p. 5, 1. 13). 

"Thys mistery treuly fro many is hydd, and to few moste speciall it is scheuyd " 
(p. 6, 1. 31). 

"All sayntis treuly miracles hafe nojt done, nouder in )>ere lyf or aftyr t)ere 
dede, nor all dampned, owdyr in J>ere lyfe or after J^ere dede, miracle haue wantyd" 
(p. 8, 1. 27). 

" I?e ffadyr is called, because of hym-self he gatt a sone ; \>e sone is cald, be-caus 
of i>e fadyr he is gottyn ; J>e holy goste, be-caus of bothe i>e holy fader & holy sone 
he isspiryd" (p. 16, 1. 3). 

" ffor ilk parfyte )»is vnderstandis, that no-}>ing to god es more dere ]>en innocens, 
no-)jinge more plesand ben gude will" (p. 17, 1. 28). 

"I ioye not hot in god, I sorou not hot for my sjnne ; no->inge I lufe hot god, 
no-)>ing I trist hot hyme ; no-l>inge me heuys hot synne, no-j?inge me gladyns hot 
criste" (p. 28, 1. 11). 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 63 

* ' ffor \>e more luste )>ai haue, )>e sonar )>ai fay 11 ; & qwhilst J»a haue prosperite, 
)>a parisch ; and qwhils \>a, ar besy with lust to be fed, strenght of body & mynde 
wrechidly J>a loys " (p. 53, 1. 16). 

"No l>inge is meriar J>en Ihesu to synge, no J^inge more lykand l>en Ihesu to 
here" (p. 57, 1. 3). 

' ' f)e more truly fro erthly Jjoghtis I am lyft, )>e more I feyll swetnes desyred ; 
t>e more fleschly desyrs ar slokynde, J'e truliar euerlastynge are kyndyld " (p. 58, 
1. 25). 

" Hym truly none erthly t>inge likys J>at truly lufys criste, for be gretnes of lufe 
all passand semys fowle, with fflescly eyn bodily )>ingis ar seyn, hot with clene hert 
& meyk heuenly Hngis rightwes behald" (p. 61, 1. 29). 

"And if )>ou desyr ))is warldis despisars to folowe, ))inke not what })0U forsakis, 
hot qwhat l>ou despisis, with qwhat desyr J>i will to god i>ou oflyrs, with how grete 
desyre of lufe )>i prayers J>ou presentis, with howe greet heyt of godis seinge )>ou 
longis, to hym he ioynd " (p. 64, 1. 36). 

' ' Guyde awe to dreyd J>at l>ai fall not to yll, and ill may trowe )>at )>ai fro t>er 
males may ryse" (p. 67, 1. 21). 

"Qwhen J>ai sothely al \>er strength & youth has spend be wronge «fe law in 
gettynge of possessions, afterward in age )>a rest, sikirly kepand )>at >a with wronge 
hauegettyn" (p. 68, 1. 5). 

* ' Sothely of J)isterys feloand, criste favirand, \>e mynde to lufe meruelusly sal 
be warmyd, & warmyd it sal be gladynd, and glad in-to lyfe contemplatyfe sal be 
lyft" (p. 71, 1. 7). 

' ' Grete lyknge I had in wildyrnes to sytt, i>at I far f roo noys swetlyar mote 
synge & with qwhyknes of hart likyngeste louynge I mote feyll, be qwhilke doutles 
of his gyft I ha takyn, qwhome abown al J?inge wondirfully I ha lufyd" (p. 73, 
1. 31). 

' ' pis appreuynge mens alowans I cal nott, for oft ^ai erre in ber allowyng, slike 
chesand als god despisyd, & despysand )>at god has chosyn" (p. 74, 1. 31). 

" Lyglit gretnes of gyftis me delitis, & tariynge of lufe with loys me ponyschis, 
qwyls ba cum J>at me takes, & takand refreschis" (p. 88, 1. 5). 

" pis lufe to fyre vnslokynd I lykyn ; the whilk no power of enmys may cast 
dowen, no softnes of flatery may ouyrcum" (p. 97, 1. 12). 

"He certan with endles lufe J>at is not byrnyd, with teris nedis to be purgyd" 
(p. 97, 1. 37). 

" pis warld is parfite if we owr myndes fro lufe of creaturis pythely depart & to 
onely god l>ame truly with-owte departynge loyn" (p. 98, 1. 20). 

' ' Truly it behoues }>at smale synnes we be not glad to do )>at will grete synnes 
parfitely eschw. He truly J>at knawyngly & wilfully fallis in-to )>e lest, vnauisyd 
to gretter oft-tymes sal fall" (p. 103, 1. 37). 



64 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 

IV. MECHANICAL DEVICES. 

(1.) Alliteration. 

The presence of figures of similarity in sound has always been 
a more or less marked feature of English prose style. Tupper ^ 
has shown how wide their use is in Anglo-Saxon prose, while 
Middle English gives frequent reminders of their conscious 
employment. It is interesting to observe how much authors, as 
late as Macaulay and Stevenson were dependent upon alliteration 
and kindred artificialities. Stevenson^ not only betrayed his 
admiration for such devices, but even went so far as to suggest 
to writers their careful study and use. Perhaps it is due to such 
examples that we find in the work of a present day student and 
critic of style, Brownell,^ sentences showing alliteration used pre- 
cisely in the manner of early prose. The volume offers such 
striking specimens as the following : 

"But his nearest approach, to passion is petulance, except when he is occupied 
with reprehension or reproof" (p. 58). "So much struggle in the pursuit of 
mere simplification, so much apologetics for so concise a credo, such a wide wiaste 
of philosophizing for such a circumscribed /oothold of /aith, such a sea of specula- 
tion through which to reach so narrow a strand of certainty ! To arrive at his 
not complex philosophy Carlyle passed i^rough a prodigious amount of i/iinking ; 
(Zemon-rfriven and tempest-<ossed in the process" (p. 58). "X>ithyramb in its 
praise is doubtless out of date, but it has not given place to dithyramb in 
its censure" (p. 69). 

With representative authors so far removed from early tradi- 
tions, using instruments usually considered the more fitting 
property of prose in its beginnings, or of prose in periods 
purposely artificial, it seems justifiable to consider this tendency 
as evidence of the regard for such stylistic devices. 

^ Cf. J. W. Tupper, Tropes and Figures in Anglo-Saxon Prose, Baltimore, 1897. 

''Cf. K. L. Stevenson, "On Style in Literature." Contemporary Review, Vol. 47 
(1885). Cf. W. P. Chalmers, Charakteristische Eigenschaften von R. L. Stevensons 
StU, Marburg, 1902. 

8Cf. W. C. Brownell, Victorian Prose Masters, New York, 1902. 



The Prose Style of Richard RoUe of Hampole. 65 

Child (p. 64) declared that " the first general common use of 
alliteration in English prose was due to the Guevarists, or early 
Euphuists." He continues, " This point established, the question 
rises — how came this and why ? The simple reply is that it was 
due to the fact that at the very time when the Guevaristic cultus 
was growing into the more definite form of Euphuism, alliteration 
had just made a sudden reappearance in fresh vigor in English 
verse. But how then is the transference of its use to prose to be 
accounted for, a thing which had never ^ before taken place?" 
In an appendix to his study Child says (p. 120), "Alliteration 
occurs in Middle English prose generally in impassioned passages" 
and then refers to the Meditatio, edited by Ullmann in Engl. Stud., 
VII : " It may be used," he observes, " to give distinction to 
particular words, i. e., emphasize their logical relation to the whole 
thought, but is seldom used to emphasize the logical relation of 
two or more words to each other." Exceptions are such formu- 
laic pairs as " true and trusty," " made or marred," " not for the 
learned but for the lewd." He finds in Dan Michel's Ayenbite 
a remarkable exception. In this work cases occur of parisonic 
antithesis emphasized by having the balanced words alliterate. 
For example : " Hit ys wel ssort ine ?^-ordes : and wel lang ine 
wytte. Liht to zigge an sotil to onderstonde," which in the origi- 
nal reads " Elle est moult couerte en paroles . e mout longue en 
sentence . legiere a dire e soutiue a entendre " " Yef j^ou wylt 
libbe ynliche, lyerne to sterve gledliche " " be urylle ne be ivil- 
ninge." Wider study of Richard Rolle, in his use of devices of 
this nature, than was possible to Child writing in 1894 makes his 
style an earlier prefigurement than the Ayenbite of the Euphuistic 
peculiarities. Horstman says of Rolle (ii, p. xviii) " as a writer 

* To this he adds a foot-note, " This ' never,' we hope, can justify itself. Lyly's 
prose is prose ; Aelfric's inclines towards being verse. He bx'eaks the law of 
alliteration of his time, only as he breaks the rhythmical. And when we meet 
such phrasing as this (Gerefa, 3) : 'Ac he mot aeg'Ser witan ge laesse ge mare, ge 
hetere ge maetre, 'Saes ^e to tune belimp'S, ge on tune ge on dune, ge on wuda ge on 
tuaetere, ge on felda ge on /aide, ge inne ge ute,' we recognize that we have to do 
with a jingling formula, not with prose." Only when Kichard Rolle is apparently 
under the influence of the "canor" do we find his prose too metrical for study 
as prose. 



66 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 

he took up the old traditions of the North : he revived the allitera- 
tive verse. I cannot discover any previous attempts in that 
direction, and do not liesitate to ascribe to him the revival of this 
verse which forms so prominent a part in the vernacular verse 
of the 14th century. He first employed it in Latin." Perhaps 
it is just as safe to say that he was the first to make definite use 
of alliteration in the vernacular prose, being influenced by his 
own verse to make the transfer as the Euphuists were by the 
revival of alliteration in the verse of their time. Although 
the occurrences are numerous, considering the quantity and date 
of the prose, it would neither be possible nor of value to attempt 
a thorough-going comparison with the methods of the highly 
developed Euphuism as shown by the types of Child. The 
examples collected are sufficient to show that Rolle deliberately 
employed devices, natural to him in verse, to add to his prose 
euphony and emphasis. Typical specimens, arranged to show 
simple and more complex types, are the following : 

(o) " l^e /andynges of tlie/ende" "hai gif ioy end/es for a /itell ioy of J>is 
/yfe" "Jjai fall in /ustes & /ikynges of this worlde" (p. 4). "& gaf Jjam sithen 
entere/y & perfite/^/ to {>e M & >e foiiyng of J>at Zorde Ihesu Criste " "A foule 
thyng it es to hafe fykyng & de/ite" (p. 8). "And, sotheZy, oure Me es /es j^an 
a poynt, if we Ziken it to he /yfe hat /astes ay " (p. 19). "bot fifes hare bodi & 
hair savvte in Imt & tetchery of Hs /yfe" (p. 20). "To Aerbar hjm hat hase na 
hovfsyng" (p. 47). "hat hou /eue al flesch?y /ufe, and al /ykyng hat fettes he til 
hie Iliesn Crist verra/y" (p. 50). "Al ^^erisches & ^^asses hat we with eghe see 
It uanes into M;retchednes, he tt'elth of his worlde. Rohes and ritches rotes in dike. 
X>elites & rfrewryse stynk sal ful sone. hair golde & haire tresoure drawes ham til 
dede Al he wikked of his w'orlde, c?rawes til a dale, hat hai may se hare sorrowyng 
whare waa es euer stabel. Bot he may syng of solace hat lufed Ihesu Criste" 
(p. 53). "bot al he delytes of his world, er /aynt and/als, &/ayland in maste 
nede " (p. 63) . "use he stalworthly in liys lufe, & he sal sa stabyly sett he hat al 
he solace of his world sal not remove he" (p. 64). " Swete Ihesu, I hanke he 
euermore for hat schmne & sc^enschip hat hou suflfridist in hi buffetinge : for 
manye a soor strook hou suffridist hanne for eche of hem stroof to smyte bifore 
ohere" (p. 95). "How hai his lufly /ace all with spyttyng /yled, How hai 
buf/etted he/ayrest/ace of al mankynde " (p. 112). 

(b) "And sa mykell es he he wer, hat he wate noght hat he es yll, & es Aalden 
& /ionord of men as wyse & Aali " (p. 6). "so hat he myght susten goddjs seruys 
till his f/ede-f?ay " (p. 7). " hat will stalworth/^/ be /ufed, & lastandly be serued " 
(p. 8). "when we er s<renghfull to s^ande agaynes \>e prjne & he aperte fandyng 
of he deuell " (p. 9). " pe jfodenes of god it es, hat he comfortes ham tt'ondyrfuUy 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 67 

)>at has na conifortes of he tforlde'-' (p. 11). "comfortand noglit ham )>at er in 
sorow or in sekenes or in pouert or in penance or in pryson " (p. 24). "with- 
owten thoghtes of I'anitese or of lices, as J>ou war in sylence & slepe & .sette in Noe 
schyppe" (p. 42). "For-J)i, if we couayte to fle t>e payne of purgatory, us 
behoues restreyne us perfite/y fra J^e iust & be Hkyng & al \>e il cZefytes & luikked 
drede of )>is worlds" (p. 59). "and with al J>at on \>i swete face spytted so/ouly, 
and so /ouly engleymede H /ayre /ace with J^e /oule styngynge spyttynge of the 
/oul cursyd Ines, & fiofetede & smyten and 6etyn on J^i swete lied with Inne" 
(p. 84). "Alas hat I schal lyue and se my gracyous lord so soffrenge and so raeke, 
J>at neuere trespasyd, so schamely bedygt ! be (/rncchynge & be ^rouynge, be sorwe 
& be sf/chynge, be rewthe of hys chere, I wolde were my deth. pe crowne of al 
blysse, bat crownes alle 6/essede, & A-yng is of alle /;ynges, & lord is of /ordys, is of 
Aelle-^oundys crouned with thorn ys ; be worchype of heuene cZespysed and c?efonled " 
(p. 85). "Thorowe be souerayne wysdome and be grete grace of be (/loryouse 
gyhe of oure lorde Ihesu Criste //oddis son of heuene, if bay be sadly soungene or 
saide in a clene herte with luie and mekenes and /ufely drede in be Zouynge of 
godd, bay bryng in till us 6ryghte irynnande 6y-haldynge ?nengede with ?«.yrthe, 
and .selcouthe schynynge fra be Aeghenes of henene with gleteryng and glemyng, 
with myrthe and melodye, that herte unclosande bat lufes Ihesu Criste goddes 
Sonne of heuene with-owttene forgetyng, whare be haly gaste dwelles 6alefull 
6andes 6rystande with be 6rynnynge of lufe bare be heghe name of Ihesu duelles 
euer in mynde" (p. 295). " Prayere es euer-mare jjlesande to godd with lowe 
67-yghtly 6rennande in a meke herte, with owttene s?*(okynge s??!elland full svvetly, 
in all meke myndis haldand >e Inie of oure /orde godd hate in oure Aertes. 
Prayere puttes at be/ende and Aaldes hyme obake and makes Ayme to/aile and 
/lee as a/onne standande q/erre" (p. 299). " Prayere uesches of us all icykkid 
werkes and all sare synns ; apone all wyse it dystruyes syne and puttes it undire, 
and irynnes insundir be tannde of all 6ale with a /erly /yre /estened in lufe 
snythand oure Aertes if we will hate syne, with a/erly/yre/lyande/ra heuene as 
/yre owtt of /lyntte, /erly to behalde" (p. 299). 

(c) "& base mare delite in be /ylth of baire /lesch, ban in be /airbede of 
heuen" (p. 4). " pe mare ioy & wonduryng bai haue with-outen of be Zouyng 
of men, ay be /es ioy bai haue within of be luf of god " (p. 8). "All thyng bat as 
af/iction for bi /esche, do it : so bat bare be nane, bat may passe be in pennance ' ' 
(p. 14). "noght rusand hym of bis rightwisnes, bot sorowand of his syn" 
(p. 46). "If bou kan noght ?yf witbowten /elescbip : /yft bi thoght til Aeuen, 
bat bou may/ynd com/orth with aungels & Aalows, be whilke wil Aelpe be til god 
& noght /ett be als bi/eschly/rendes dos" (p. 64). "Swete Ihesu, git bi bodi is 
lyk to a mede ful of swete flouris & /(olsum Aerbis : so is bi ^odi ful of woundis, 
swete saueringe to a deuout sonle, & Aolsum as Aerbis to ech sinful man. Xow, 
swete Ihesu, I biseche bee grannte me swete sauour of merci, & be Aolsum reseite 
of (/race" (p. 97). "And als jr/adfull als bis come sal be unto his cAosyn cAilder, 
als prymly and als agthful sal it be til base wryckched caytifs bat has led baire Zif 
in lust and likynges of baire flesshe and in dedely synne" (p. 117). "And als he 
sal be wrothefull unto base weryed loryccbes : so to bis awen childer bat here has 
wrogth bis wille /ufely be sal be and toynly on to foke"(p. 117). "For at bis 
income : he uakkyns be saule steris it & softis it & (cascbis hire icondes with wyue : 



68 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 

& softis J>aim with oile ; )>at is s^eris it to forthink bitterli >at it has misdone, & 
softis it with hope of i?ierci &, forgifnes of 6'ynnis" (p. 148). 



(2.) Repetition} 

The examples under this head are very numerous. Many of 
the specimens show considerable skill and give proof that Rolle 
wrote with great care. No other author of the period used the 
forms of repetition so frequently and so effectively as Richard 
Rolle. From the many examples collected, the most typical 
are the following : 

" pai gif ioy endles for a litell ioy of J)is lyfe " (p. 4). 

' ' & makes it dene, to receyue >e luf of Ihesu Criste, J^at may noght he loued 
botincZejin.es" (p. 12). 

" For we wate neuer when we sal dye, ne whare we sal dye, ne how we sal dye^' 
(p. 19). 

' ' If )jou lufe hym mykel : niykel joy & swetnes & byrnyng K>u feles in his htfe ' ' 
(p. 30). 

"Blyssed es he or scho >at es in J^is dec/re: hot gitt er >ai blyssedar ))at myglit 
halde his c?e(7?-e " (p. 31). 

"And >at order ^at leste es bryght, es seucnsythe sa brycjht als J>e son es. And 
als ^ou sees )>e son bryghtar )jan a kandele, )>e kandel bryghtar J^an \>e mone, \>e mone 
bryghtar j^an a sterne : also er J^e orders in heuen ilkane bryghtar )>an other ' ' 
(p. 50). 

"God es lyght, & byrnyng. Lyght clarifies oure skyll, byrnyng kyndels oure 
couayties" (p. 36). 

"If }>ou haue dehjte in ]>e name of religion: loke J^at )>ou haue mare delyte in \>e 
dede Mt falles til religion" (p. 68). 

" pan may I say J>at contemplacion es a wonderful joy of goddes luf, J^e whilk joy 
es louynq of god, J^at may noght be talde, & )p3X wonderful louyng es in >e saule" 
(p. 48). 

^ Cf. G. Gerber, Die Sprache als Kunst, Berlin, 1885, Vol. ii, p. 180. 

Cf. Child, p. 54. Eepetition in its various forms is one of the most favorite 
devices of the early Euphuists. In order to compare Richard Rolle' s usage with 
that of Berners and North, a few specimens are presented. 

From The Golden boke of Marcus Aurelius : 

" . . . . that for to doo one good dede we lacke tyme, and for to do many shrewde 
tournes, we haue to moche tyme" (p. 17). 

"For one thynge by dyuers opinions ought to be detemiyned. But many thinges 
by one opinion oughte not to be determyned" (p. 21). 

"All the good werkes of men may be condemned with the yll intentions of theym 
that be yll : But the good condicions have such a priuilege, that of the yl the good 
is praysed, and the good appro veth the yll" (p. 23). 



The Prose Style of RicJiard Rolle of HampoJe. 69 

' ' grawnte me of ^i grace a sygt of f^i soreive, a poynt of J^i peyne to playe me 
with : \>at I may in a poynt somwhat fele, and a part of /)[ soreive, )>at I haue a 
mad" (p. 91). ' 

"Swete Jhesu, binde me to \>ee in hope: so J>at al myn hope & trist be oonli in 
>ee ; late neuere myn hope be to streite : lest I falle in vfunhope; ne to large lest 
I rise in to onerhope " ( p. 94) . 

"<fe lete )>i meeknes & Ht doom )>at J>ou nnskilfulli suffridist, excuse me fro Ht 
doom )>at I skilfuUi schulde haue" (p. 95). 

"Lord >at madist me & hast goiten me manye giftis, gostly, bodili and worldli, 
I biseche \>ee, graunte me grace to usen hem all in J>i seruice & to j^at eende to 
whiche J^ou gaue hem to me J^at I euere worschipe J'ce in \>i giftis ; & graunte me 
grace euere to meken me in ^i giftis, to holde me apaied wi'S \>i giftis, & neuere to 
be presumptuous ne proud of H giftis" (p. 92). 

' ' Now open l>i hert wyde to thynke on l>ase paynes }>at Cryst for J>e thoolede, and 
thynke J^aim in ]>i hert rygth als be ^aim /?oolede" (p. 112). 

In cannot be shown that such figures of euphony as annomina- 
tion and assonance, consciously employed, occur. Under conso- 
nance the examples found are too sporadic to be of especial value. 
A few cases are the following : 

"comen to comforth bam" (p. 12). "the erowne of al blis hat crowneth al 
blissid^' (p. 98). "bei drow and s^reynyd be streygte" (p. 86). 

Though Richard Rolle had a marked feeling for rime as shown 
by his verse and by that peculiar prose doubtless written while 

"As we emperours do say, the same wyll our subjects say: as we do, they wyll 
do : that we forsake they wyll leave : yf we lese our sehes, they wyll lose them 
selues : yf we wyn, they wyll wynne : and fynally our welth is theyr welth, and our 
harme is theyr harme. . . . Take ye hede and let us take hede : Haue ye in mynde 
and let us have in inynd, that they which be of strange landes going through strange 
landes into strange landes . . . ." (p. 40). 

From The Diall of Princes : 

"In this lande, there are none but proude, and arrogante men, that delyte to 
commaunde. In this lande there are none other but envious men, that know 
nought els, but malice. In this lande, there are idel men, whiche doe nothinge 
but loase their time . ..." (p. 5). 

" I call God to witnes and sweare to the, that this is not Borne, neither hath it 
any likenesse of Rome, nor any grace to be Borne, and he that wolde saye, that 
thys Bome was the olde i^ome knoweth litle of Borne" (p. 6). 

"For though God suffred the wicked to be ivicked a whyle, god wyl not therefore 
suffer, that one euyll man procure an other to do euil" (p. 11). 

" Princes are much bound to do well, because they were created of god reason- 
able men : but they are bound much more, because they be christians, and others 
more bound because they were made mighty" (p. 12). 

"For there is no man so sage nor profound, but that another is as sage and 
profounde" (p. 12). 



70 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 

under the influence of the " canor/' rime as a part of his prose 
technique is not in great evidence. Some examples are : 

" chaungyng of lastand gode for a passanrfe delite" (p. 4). "pan \>i sawle es 
Ihesu Iniand, Ihesu thynkand, Ihesu desirand, anly in i>e couayties of hym 
anedande, til hym syngand, of hym hyrnand, in hym restanrf" (p. 32). "hym 
behoues lufe lastanrf thyng lustandly and passand thyng passanc?/^/ " (P- ^^)- 
' ' for to lone J>ee swete Jhesu, moost needful, moost raeedful, & moost spedeful ' ' 
(p. 94). " & so, bong, I be not wor>i in ^erte to be h'^^tid : my nede, lord, & my 
wikidnes aski)> to be r/j^f'rf " (p. 103). 

We do not find Richard Rolle exo^sgively fond of combining 
two or more words in his sentences to produce variety or strength. 
A restrained use of such combinations, however, is a mark of his 
style. This tendency to cou])le words is common in Middle Eng- 
lish prose. Chaucer in the Mel'iheus shows the mannerism at its 
extreme. The verbose Usk's prose, strange to say, is not espe- 
cially marked by this peculiarity. A few citations will show the 
usage of Rolle : ^ 

'^vanyfees & ryches'' "pryde & delyte" (p. 5). " hcdden & honord^^ (p. 6). 
"sa wayke & so fehy II" "and noght in a titill & in a schoi't tyme " (p. 7). 
" enterely & perfitely" '^lykyng & delite'^ (p. 8). "o7cre-iome, or oure full" (p. 
15). "hot turnyng fra all ]>e couaytyse & )>e likyng & i>e occupacions & bisynes " 
(p. 18). "In this maner es rerra?/ lufe & ^>'e!<) " (p. 62). "Lord, I pray \>e and 
heseke J>e J^at J>ou jeue me sofferynge and strenkethe for to with-stande stedefastely aj; 
eynes alle I'e assaylynges & fondynges of my/oo.s and of my enemys gostely & bodly. 
... I thanke \>e of alle )>e peynes and schcnnus J^at Jjou soffred beforn Pylate, and of 
alle i>i passes and ]>i steppys hat }>ou jedyst for me in al \>at sorewe" (p. 84). 

Rolle's desire to write clearly is also seen in his occasional 
addition of clauses, usually introduced by " that," to explain an 
expression just used. For example : 

"Some l^e deuell deceyues thurgh vayne glory, }>at es ydil ioy " (p. 5). "\>e 
whilk despises all erthly thyng, J^at es at say, lufs it noght" (p. 16). "For we 

^ The use of doublets is not a prominent feature of the genuine Euphuistic prose. 
Lyly, however, does at times indulge to some extent. Cf. e. g. Bond i, 192 : 
" But why go I about to prayse Nature, the which as yet was neuer any Irape so 
wicked & barbarous, any Turke so vile and brutish, any beast so dull and sence- 
lesse, that coulde, or would, or durst disprayse or contemne. Doth not Cicero 
conclude and allowe, that if wee followe and obey Nature, we shall neuer erre ? 
Doth not Aristotle alleadge and confirme, that Nature frameth or maketh nothing 
in any poynte rude, vayne and unperf ect ? ' ' 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 71 

lyue bot in a poynt — Jjat es J^e leste thyng )>atinaybe" (p. 19). " perplexite, 
J>at es dowt what es to do" (p. 21). 

In conclusion it may be said that Richard Rolle is seldom 
obscure. His vocabulary does not show many difficult words, 
neither does it give evidence of a strong desire to coin new words, 
so decided a mark of prose in the following century. 



V. ILLUSTRATIONS DRAWN FROM NATURAL 
HISTORY IN MIDDLE ENGLISH PROSE. 

It has frequently been pointed out that one of the most marked 
characteristics of the Euphuistic rhetoric is the excessive employ- 
ment of illustrations, many drawn directly from nature, others 
from the science and natural history of the times, others from the 
classics, notably Pliny, Aristotle and Plutarch. That a like use 
of illustrations of the same nature is noticeable in Middle English 
style has been stated by several writers. Of these, Child has gone 
so far as to single out a particular monument, the Ayenhite of 
Inwyt, of which he says (p. 122), "Lorens's use of allusions to 
natural history should be referred to as suggesting Lyly if not 
Guevara. They are drawn of course from the bestiaries, but are 
used precisely as Lyly uses them — the " adder called aspis," the 
adder Serayn, the beast- Hyane, the Coccyx or cuckoo, the lynx, 
chameleon, salamander and turtle. All of these but one or two 
are used by Lyly. Loreus's use of them serves to show how early 
this class of allusions became popular in France." In the fol- 
lowing pages we shall present specimens of such illustrative mate- 
rial gathered from some Middle English prose monuments. The 
list makes no pretension to completeness. It is merely an attempt 
to show that the usage was wide in Middle English and that in 
many ways it resembled the Euphuistic rhetoric. The employment 
of so artificial a device in both periods discloses a striking agree- 
ment in point of technique. With its Bestiaries and Lapidaries 
to draw from, the earlier prose was decidedly anticipatory of the 
latter, when the Renaissance made popular new sources which 



72 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 

served as the storehouses of marvelous facts for illustration. In 
Lyly the convention reached its height. His pages are so over- 
burdened with such allusions that the reader soon becomes wearied 
and confused. 

It is often said ^ that the Euphuistic style is easily imitated. In 
a measure this is true, but an extended, consistent attempt to 
imitate Lyly in this one respect would soon show, not only his 
wide reading but also his wonderful ingenuity in selecting that 
which would best serve his purpose. Modern science, because 
superficially familiar to the general reader, is lacking in the 
poetical, startling elements of what was once accepted as science. 
The wonderful beasts, stones, and trees of our early prose never 
could become so familiar as to lose their charm. Nevertheless 
the modern writer has a vastly richer field in the achievements 
and marvels of science of today, but the knowledge necessary to 
use these wonders in illustration accurately is too exacting for him 
to produce many serviceable figures. The future stylist, however, 
cannot ignore this field. A mark of his skill may rest in the 
ability to adapt the results of science for illustrative purposes. 
The original matter lent itself easily and readily enough, but the 
liberty which the mediaeval writer possessed in this respect fre- 
quently betrayed him into applications that were both forced and 
incongruous. Such failures serve to bring out the inherent arti- 
ficiality of the stylistic feature. We quote, for example, from the 
Ayenhite of Inwyt (p. 257) : 

" fier is an eddre hat is y-hote in latin aspis. l^et is of zuiche kende ^et hi 
stoppeJ> )?et on eare mid er\>e and \>et o>er mid hare tayle \>et hi ne yhere J>ane 
charmere. pe ilke eddre ons tek)> a wel grat wyt \>et we ne hyere nagt )>ane 
charmere J>et is )>e lyejere and J'e flatour. J>et ofte becharmej> J^e riche men. Ac 
huo \>et stoppel> \>et on eare mid erj^e and J>et oj^er mid J^e tayle : he ne ssolde habbe 
none hede to bi be-charmed of \>e dyeule ne of kueade tongen. pe ilke stoppe)? 
J^et on eare mid erj^e : J'Ct )>engj> }>et he is of erj^e and to erj^e ssel come . . . pet 
oJ>er eare stoppi mid J>e tayle uor to bej^enche of he dya^e het him ssel wel 
astonie." 

^Cf. G. P. Baker in Representative English Comedies, New York, 1903, p. 266, 
"The Anatomic, at least, is such a book, as a recent university graduate of the 
present day, well read in some of the classics, and especially susceptible to new 
literary influences and cults, might compile." 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of JHampole. 73 

That the earlier Euphiiistic ^ prose could be equally forced in 
the application of similar illustrative material one quotation from 
Book II, Chapter xviii, of The Diall of Princes, entitled " That 
Ladies and other gentlewomen oughte not to be ashamed to nour- 
ishe their children with their own breastes," may serve to show : 

" Al that shal reade this wryting, shall finde it true, and yf they wyl, they may 
see as I have sene it by experience : that after the Ape hath had her yonglinges, 
she alwaies hath them in her armes, so longe as they sucke, so that oftentimes 
there is suche strife betwene the male, and the female, which of them shall have 
the yongelinges in their armes, that the beholders are enforced to part them with 
battes. Lette us leave the beastes that are in the fieldes, and talke of the byrdes 
that are in the neastes : the whiche do laye egges to have yong, yet have they no 
mylke to bringe them up. What thinge is so strange to see, as a small byrde that 
hath under her winges 5 or 6 litell naked byrdes, the which when she hath bached 
she had neither milke to nourishe them, nor corne to give them, they have neither 
winges to flye, fethers to cover them, nor any other thing to defend them : yet in 
all this weakeness and pouertie their mother forsaketh them not, nor committeth 
them to any other, but bringeth them up al her selfe. That which nature pro- 
vided for the swannes is no lesse marveilous, inespecyally when they nourishe 
their yong signettes in the water. Forasmuche as duringe the time that they can 
not swimme, the motheres alwaies in the day are with their yonglinges in their 
neastes, and in the nighte the fathers carye them under their proper winges (to 
refresh them) unto the water. It is, therefore to be though te, since these swannes 
so lovingly beare their yonglinges under their winges, that they would carry 
them in their armes if they were men, and also give them sucke with their owne 
breastes, yf they were women." 

In his English works Richard Rolle has but few examples of 
allusions drawn from the stock of unnatural natural history. His 
Incendium Amoris, however, translated by Richard Misyn, under 
the title The Fire of Love, gives us further specimens, so that the 
entire showing is quite enough to prove Rolle's familiarity with 
the common source and his appreciation of its didactic and artistic 
value. We shall first quote from his original English texts : 

' ' Bot J^e sawle J^at es in J>e thyrd degre, es als byrnand fyre, and as \>e nyght- 
tyngale,^ Jjat lufes sang & melody, & fayles for mykel lufe " (Horetman, i, 33). 

iCf. Bond, I, p. 134. 

* Cf . Lyly, Eupku.es and His England, ' ' Louers seeke not those thinges which 
are most profitable, but most pleasant . . . they followe the note of the Nightin- 
gale, which is saide with continual strayning to singe, to perishe in hir sweet 
layes" (Bond ii, 181). 



74 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 

" pan his [es] \>e kynd of >e lyoun >at he feris all beestes with his romying and 
makes J^aim so hertles for drede }>at )>ai dar nowr flee ; bot )>ogh his noyse be 
hidouse til all bestes, yhet it comfortis his awene whelpis and whyckenes J>aim to 
life. Rigth so sal Ihesu Crist beer hym at i>e day of dome til all )?at haf lifd in 
syne and wald mak na endyng of j^aire ille life ; at J^is Callyiig )>as sal be so feride 
and so unmyghty of J?aire self J)at >ai sal nogtli mow stire j^aim on na syde, bot 
t)are bihoues >aim to take als )>ai haf seruede, ille or gud" (Horstman, i, 117). 

" Ysidore telles of a litelflie : >at is cald Saura, & J^is flie bitakenes grace bifore- 
sterand. pe kynde of bis flie : is til be enemi til alle wormes of venyme ; swa J>at 
whare he sees ani worme to-ward man til stang him )>are he slepes in wildemes : 
he flies bifore to \>e man & lightis opon his face & bites him a litell ; & ]>a.re- 
thorough he wakys : or \>e beste come til stange him. Bi J>is Saura : is under- 
standen grace J^at god sendis til man : agayn \>e fandynges of \>e fende J>at stanges 
oft venemously .... Bot >e unkynd dose agayn )>is grace & fordose it : als 
Virgil did with ]>\s litell flie : >at sauid him fra J>e deade. He lai at slepe : & a 
neddre come til him-ward til stang him, bot t>is flie Saura flied bifore & lightid on 
his forheuid & prikkid him a litell, & >are-with he wakenid : als ]>e neddre come ; 
bot )>is Virgil in his wakenynge he felid his forheuid smerte : & smate him-selfe 
in i>e fronte & swa he slogh i>e flie ; & bus he qwitte him his seruice : J>at sauid his 
life. For->i fordo bou noght goddis grace when it comes to be : til warne be of )>i 
harme & steere be til gode" (Horstman, i, 135). 

The coDcluding example, the Moralia Ricardi heremite de natura 
apis, unde quasi apis argumentosa, is interesting enough to be 
given in its entirety : 

'* J5e hee^ has three kyndis. Ane es >at scho es neuer ydill, and scho es noghte 
with thaym bat will noghte wyrke, bot castys thaym owte and puttes thaym awaye. 
Anothire es bat when scho flyes scho takes erthe in hyr fette, bat scho be noghte 
lyghtly ouer-heghede in the ayere of wynde. The thyrde es bat scho kepes clene 
and bryghte hire wyngez. Thus ryghtwyse men bat lufes god, are neuer in ydyll- 
nes : ffor owythre bay ere in trauayle, prayand or thynkande or redande or othere 
gude doande, or withtakand ydill mene and schewand thaym worthy to be put 
fra be ryste of heuene ffor bay will noghte trauayle here, pay take erthe, bat es 
bay halde bam-selfe vile & erthely that thay be noghte blawene with be wynde of 
vanyte and of pryde. Thay kepe thaire wynges clene, that es be twa commande- 
mentes of charyte bay fulfill in gud concyens, and they hafe othyre vertus unblen- 
dyde with be fylthe of syne and unclene luste. Arestotill sais bat be bees are fegh- 
tande agaynes hym bat will drawe baire hony fra thayme. Swa sulde we do 
agaynes deuells bat afforces thame to reue fra us be hony of poure lufe & of grace. 
For many are bat neuer kane halde be ordyre of lufe ynesche baire frendys sybbe 
or ffremmede, bot outhire bay lufe baym ouer-mekill, settand thaire thoghte 
unryghtwysely on thaym : or bay luf thayme ouer-lytill yf bay doo noghte all as 
bey wolde till bame. Swylke kane noghte fyghte for theire hony, ffor-thy be 

^ For a long account of the habits of the bee based, according to Bond, on Pliny, 
cf. Lyly's Euphues and His England, Bond, n, 44. 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 75 

deuelle turnes it to wormed and makes J^eire saules ofte-sythes full bitter in angwys 
and tene, and besynes of vayne tlioghtes and ol>er wrechidnes, ffor thay are so heuy 
in erthely frenchype >at J^ay may noglite flee in till J?e lufe of Ihesu Criste, in J^e 
wylke J>ay moghte wele for-gaa J>e lufe of all creaturs lyfande in erthe. Whare- 
fore, accordandly Arystotill sais l>at some fowheles are of gude flyghyng, ^at passes 
fra a lande to a-notbire. Some are of ill flyghynge for heuyas of body and for-J>i 
J>aire neste es nogbte ferre fra t>e erthe. Tbus es it of thayme ))at turnes >ame to 
godes seruys. Some are of gude fleyghynge for thay flye fra erthe to heuene and 
rystes thayme thare in thoghte, and are fedde in delite of goddes lufe, and has 
thoghte of na lufe of {>e worlde. Some are J^at kan nogbte flyghe fra ^is lande bot 
in \>e waye late theyre herte ryste and delyttes J^aym in sere lufes of mene and 
womene, als l>ay come & gaa, nowe ane & nowe a-notbire, and in Ihesu Criste >ay 
kan fynde na swettnes or if J^ay any tyrae fele oghte it es swa lytill and swa schorte 
for othire thoghtes )>at are in thayme, )>at it brynges thaym till na stabylnes ; for 
J»ay are lyke till a fowle )>at es callede strucyo or storke, J>at has wenges and it may 
noghte flye for charge of body. Swa j>ay hafe undirstandynge, and fastes and 
wakes and semes haly to mens syghte, but thay may noghte flye to lufe and con- 
templacyone of god, J>ay are so chargede wyth othyre afleccyons and othire 
vanytes" (Horstman, i, 193). 

The following specimens from The Fire of Love are especially 
noteworthy because of the marked antithesis in both : 

" Many forsoth )>at with me haue spoken, like wer to scorpions, for with )>ere 
hede flaterand J)ai haue fagyd, & with J^are tayl bakby tand J>ai haue smyttyn ' ' 
(p. 22, 1. 4). 

"Treuly J>ai ar lyke Jje stone })at is called topazius,^ J>e whilk seldum is fun, & 
J>erfore more precius & full dere it is had ; in whilk too colors ar ; one is moste 
pure als gold, & J^e tojjer clere als hevyn when it is bright. & all clernes of all 
stonys it ouercomys, & no l>inge fayrer is to be-hald. If any treuly it wald 
polysch, it is made [dym] ; & treuly if it be >e self be left, his clerenes is with- 
haldyn. So holy contemplatyffe of whome before we spake seldomest ar, & J>erfore 
moste dere. To gold >ai ar lyke for passynge bete of charite, and to heuyn for 

'Compare with this Lyly's "precious stone Sandastra," Bond, ii, 61 and 
"the precious stone Anthracitis," Bond, ii, 81. 

Cf. A. Waag, Kleinere Deutsche Oedichte des XL und XIL Jahi-hunderts, Halle, 
1890, p. 62, 

"Der Vim stain ist sus 
gehaizen Topazius : 
varwe habet er doch zuwa 
daz pucb saget uns so : 
diu eine ist baiter unte mare 
nSh dem bimele gevare, 
diu ander luter so daz gott." 

Cf. Ibid., p. xxvi, " Nach Marbodus de lapidibris." 



76 The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Ham])ole. 

clernes of heuenly conuersacion ; l^e whilk passys all saynts lyuys, & >erfore [ar] 
clerar and bryghtar emonge precius stonys, t^at is to say chosynn, for >is lyfe 
only louand & hauand clerar )>a er ben all odyr men J^at ar or ellis has bene. Who 
treuly slike will polysch, ]>at is to say with dignites worschip, J^e heet of J>ame J>ai 
ar besy to lessynn, \>er fayrnes & per clernes in maner to make dyme ; if Jja treuly 
worschip of principalite gett, for-sothe fowlar & of les mede ha sail be made, po 
)>er stodys berfore to take hede ^ai sail be left, )>at l>ere clerenes may incres " 
(p. 34, 1. 20). 

A few specimens, simpler in form, may be given : 

" Songe certan it sal lufe, & in Jhesu syngand, to a byrd it sal be likkynd to 
the deed syngand" (p. 100, 1. 9). 

"In the begynnynge truly of my conuersion & syngulere purpoys I J^oght I 
wald be lyke \>e lityll byrde l>at for lufe of )>q lemman longis, bot in longynge it is 
gladynd qwhen he cumys \>&t it lufis, Also it longis, bot in swetnes & heet. It is 
sayd \>e nyghtgale to songe & melody all nyght is gyfyn, Jjat sche may pleis hym 
to qwhome sche is loynyd " (p. 102, 1. 32). 

A most remarkable compilation of figures is found in the final 
example : 

"pis warld truly has likyngis of wrechydnes, ryches of vanite, wondynge 
flateryngis, dedely likeyngis, wode luste, made lufe, hateful dyrknes, mydday in 
t>e begynynge & at )>e ende nyght euerlastynge. It has also salt unsalt, sauyr 
unsauyrd, fowle bewte, horribil frenschyp, chiryschynge nyght, bittyr hony & 
kyllande fruyte. It has also a rose of stynke, Joy of waymentynge, melody off 
heuynes, louynge of despyte, truly drynke of deed, Aray of abhominacion, \>e ledar 
begiland & t>e prince downe castand. It has also J>e geme of heuynes & scornfull 
praysynge, of lillis blaknes, songe of soro & foule bewte, disco rdynge frenschyp & 
snaw blaknes, solas forsakyn, nedy kyngdome. It has a nyghtyngale mor rorynge 
J>en a cowe, A swete voys with-outyn melody, a scheep cled in foxis skyn, & a 
dowe wodar \>Qn any wode best. Flee we )>erfor bodily & warldly lufe, qwos bake 
has a pryke if all )>e face flatyr ; qwos flowre is anoytt with gall, & \>e pape of 
neddyrs, \>ol it be priuely, it beris ; qwos sauyr cuttis mans saule fro gode, & }>e 
bath byrnys with fyre of liell ; qwos gold into moll sail turne, & }>e ensens fyre of 
byrnstone sail scheed " (p. 89, 1. 25). 

This list of citations, though small, taken from the prose of 
Richard Rolle, shows that he handled the device of fabulous 
natural history with skill remarkable for the early period. He 
was the first to give to parts of his prose a form that anticipated 
the manner of the early Euphuists. 

When the large quantity of Wyclif 's prose is taken into account, 
we find that he uses illustrations of this class sparingly, though 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 77 

effectively as the selected occurrences on pages 23 and 24 of this 
paper will show. Our next text, the The Ayenhite of Inwyt, 
however, is particularly rich in striking examples of this type of 
allusion. Of those collected, the following are the most interesting : 

" pe yelpere is Jie cockou. \>et ne han nagt zinge bote of him-zelue : pis zenne is 
ybound ine )>an bet be his ogene mou{>e him yelp)?. oJ>er of his wytte. o)>er of his 
kenne. o))er of his workes. oJ>er of his prouesse" (p. 22). 

' ' panne is he of \>e kende of J>e baselycoc. uor no grenhede ne may yleste beuore 
hym. ne in gerse ne in busse ne in trauwe" (p. 28). 

" Blondere and misziggere : byej> of one scole. pise bye^ \>e tuo nykeren \>&t we 
uynde}> ine bokes of kende of bestes. Vor hy bye}> a ssewynge of j^e ze \>Qt me 
klepejj nykeren. J>et habbe)> bodyes of wyfman and tayl of uisssse. and clauen of 
arn. and zuo zuetelich zinged ]?et hi make)' slepe \>e. ssipmen and efterward his 
uorzuelgb. I'et hye\> \>& blonderes. j>et be hare uayre zang make}> slepe l^et uolk. and 
ine hare zenne. hi resemble^ an eddre J>et hatte ^erayn. J^et yern}) more zuy>ere 
)7anne hors. and o)>erhuyl vlejj. and habbe}» J>et uenym zuo Strang : J>et no triacle 
ne is J>er to nagt worJ>. Vor raj^e comJ> )>e dyat> : )>anne me uelh J)ane byte, pet 
bye)> J>e missiggeres. of huam Salomon zayl> ^et hi bytef> ase eddren in bezyukinge. 
an i>et uenim slag^ t>ri in one stroke. . . . pet is be felliste best \>et me clepe> 
hyane. J>et ondelfb \>e bodies of dyade men and hise ete^. pet hje\> i>o J>et byte)> 
and etejj be guode men of religion bet byeb dyade to the wordle. Hi byeb more 
feller banne helle. bet ne uorzuylb bote kueade. Ac hi yerneb op to be guode. 
hueruore hy byeb anlicned to be zo-^e. huanne hi heb yuarged wel blebeliche byt 
men : yclobed mid huyt. Hy byeb ase \>e Ihapwynche bet ine uel))e of man makeb 
his nest and zuo resteb. bet byeb I'e ssarnboddes \>et beulej? be floures and louieb bet 
dong" (p. 61).i 

"pes is be scorpioun bet makeb uayr mid be heauede. and enueymej> mid be 
tayle" (p. 62). 

" Alsuo deb J'e lyegere. hueruore he is ase be gamelos bet leueb by be eyr and 
nagt ne heb ine his roppes bote wynd. and heb ech manere colour bet ne heb non 
his ogen " (p. 62). 

"Zuychemen byeb anlykned to \>e />orn-hog. bet ys al ywryge mid prikyinde 
eles. and hit is to moche fel and zone hit is wro>. And banne hit is of-tyened : 
he kest out his eles of his body : arigthalf and a lefthalf " (p. 66). 

' A somewhat similar grouping is found in Gosson's The School of Abuse : 
"The scarabe flies over many a sweete flower, and lightes in a cowshard : It is 
the custome of the flie to leave the sound places of the Horse and suck at the 
Botch. The nature of Colloquintida, to draw the worst humours too itselfe : The 
maner of swine to forsake the faire fieldes, and wallow in the myre .... The 
deceitful Phisition giveth sweete Syrroppes to make his poyson goe downe the 
smoother : The Juggler casteth a myst to worke the closer : the Syrens song is the 
Saylors wracke : the Fowlers whistle the birdes death : The wholesome bayte the 
fishes bayne : The Harpies have Virgins faces, and vultures talents : Hyena 
speaks like a friend and devours like a foe: The calmest seas hide dangerous 
rockes : the Woolf iettes in Weathers felles." Quoted from Landmann, p. 85. 



78 The Prose Style of Richard RoUe of Hampole. 

' ' pe /tare yernj>. l>e gryhond hym uolgeK ^e on be drede : J^e o}>er be wylnynge. 
J>e on vly5> : )>e ojjer hyne dryf>. pe holy man yernj> ase grihond. \>et habbeb 
alday hare ege to heuene : huer hi yzyej> J^e praye : \>et hi driue)'. And Jjeruore 
hy uoryehel) alle ot)re guodes. ase del> i>e gentyl bond : huanne ha zy> his praye 
touore his egen" (p. 76). 

"panne huo J>et hedde ]>e zygbe ase he)> ]>e lynx ]>et me clepej> o))erlaker : 
leucernere. J>et yzyjjj J^orj )>ane wal alouer. ha ssolde yzy openliche bet non uayr 
body ne is : bote a huyt zech uol of donge stynkinde. and ase a donghel 
besnewed" (p. 81). 

' ' Of grat pris ase }>et gold \>et )>e more hit is ine uere : l^e more hit is clene and 
clyer and tretable. ase )>e salamandre J>et leue)> ine >e uere. and as \>e viss i>et ine 
i>e trauailinde wetere : him baj>ej> and norisse^" (p. 167). 

" Vor he ne may nagt J>olye Jjane guode smel of J>e ilke smerieles namore )>anne 
Jje boterel J>anne smel of t>e vine" (p. 187). 

" Me uint ine )>e hoc t>et spekj> of kende of bestes. ^et J>e elifans nele nagt wonye 
mid his wyue : l^erhuyle ^et hi is mid childe " (p. 224).^ 

"To loki \>et stat of wodewehod me ssel sterie be uorbisne of be turle. Vor ase 
zayjj be hoc of kende of bestes. efter bet be turle heb ylore hare make : hi ne ssel 
neuremo habbe uelagrede mid obren. ac alneway hi is one and be-ulyjt be 
uelasrede of obren " (p. 226). 

In this connection it may not be amiss to present specimens 
from another, though later, manual of conduct The Book of the 
Knight La Tour Landry,'^ written in 1371-2. Caxton translated 
this work in 1483 and published it in the following year. The 
citations, however, are from a much earlier translation : 

" Affterwarde, in sayeng youre praiers atte masse or in other place, be not like 
the crane or the tortu ; for thei are like the crane and the turtu that turnithe her 
hede and fases bacward, and lokithe ouer the shuldre, and, euer steringe with the 
hede like a vesselle, hauithe youre loke and holdith youre hede ferme as a best 
that is called a lymer, the whiche lokithe euer afore hym withoute turning her 
hede hedir or thedir, but lokithe ever forth right" (p. 15). 

1 Cf . The Dicdl of Princes : 

"For the profe of this, it neadeth not bookes to reade, but only our eyes to see : 
how the brute beastes for the moste part (when the femailes are bygge) do not 
touche them, nor yet the femailes suffer them to be touched. I meane that the 
noble and high estates ought to absente themselves from their wives carnally. . . . 
Aristotle in the firste booke de Animalihus saieth, when the Lyonisse is bigge wyth 
wealpe, the lyon doth not onely hunt for her and him selfe : but also both night 
and day, he wandereth continuallye about to watche her" (p. 95). 

^ Thomas Wright, The Book of the Knight La Tour Landry, Compiled for the 
Instruction of his Daughters. Translated from the Original French into English in the 
Reign of Henry VI, and Edited for the First Time from the Unique Manuscript in the 
British Museum, with an InXroduciion and Notes. E. E. T. S., 33. 



The Prose Style of Richard RoUe of HampoU. 79 

" And after, whanne the bisshope had shewed these ensaumples with other, he 
saide that the women that were so horned were lyche to be horned snailes and 
hertes and unicomcs. And also he saide by men that wered to shorte gownes and 
shewed her breeches, the whiche is her shame. And so the man with his clothes, 
and the woman with her homes, mockithe god. And he saide they were like the 
hertys, that bare downe her hedes in the smalle wode ; for whanne thei come to 
the chirche, and holy water be caste on hem, thei bowe downe the hede. ' Y 
doute ' saide the bisshope ' that the deuelle sitte not betwene her homes, and 
that he make hem bowe doun the hede for ferde of the holy water. For he saide 
that suche array was like the attercoppe that makithe his nettes to take the flyes or 
thei be ware, so the deuelle makithe hem to be taken in synne with the lokinge 
and sight of her tyre, the whiche makithe hym to desire and delite foule plesaunce 
of the synne of lechery, as it is more pleinly contened in the boke that is cleped 
the Lyff of Farderes" ' (p. 63). 

" I wille telle you the ensaumple of a lyon and of his properte ; whanne the 
lyonesse hath done hym any displesere or despite, he wille not turne no more to 
her of alle that day, ne that night, for no thinge that may befalle ; he shewes in 
suche wise his lordshippe. And it is a good ensaumple to eueri woman, whanne 
a wilde beste, that canne no reson but auent that meues hym, makes hemselff 
dradde and douted of his felaw. Now take hede thanne, a good woman ought 
not to displese ne disobeye her husbonde that God hath geuen her by his holy 
sacrement" (p. 86). 

" And whanne the tyme rennithe as from somer to wynter, as whanne plesaunce 
is fayled, and they see hem selff lesse honoured, thanne ofte tymes they falle into 
repentaille so that loue and plesaunce is foryete ; as the nightyngales, as longe as 
they be amerouses, they synge plesauntly day and night, and whanne they haue 
rejoysed thaire amerous desyre and plesaunces, thei make abace melodye, for 
thei synge no more" (p. 156). 

A few of the many examples in the Voiage and Travaile ^ of 
Sir John Maundeville are : 

"And then the Bird Fenix comethe, and brennethe him self to Ashes. And 
the first Day next aftre, Men fynden in the Ashes a Worm, and the secunde Day 
next aftre, Men funden a Bird quyk and perfyt ; and the thridde Day next aftre, 
he fleethe his way. And so there is no more Briddes of that Kynde in alle the 
World, but it allone. And men may well lykne that Bryd unto God ; be cause 
that there nys no God but on ; and also, that oure Lord aroos fro Dethe to Lyve, 
the thridde Day" (p. 48).« 

1 J. O. Halliwell, The Voiage and Travaile of Sir John Maundeville, Kt. Reprinted 
frrnn the Edition of 1725, with an Introduction, Additional Notes, and Glossary, 
London, 1866. The text of this edition is taken from Cotton Tit. C. xvi., written 
about the year 1400. 

»C£. The Golden boke of Marcus Aurelius: "It was closed with two leaves, 
subtyly wroughte of a red wood, that some sayde was of the tree that the Phenyl 



80 The Prose Style of Richard RoUe of Hampote. 

" And in Cycile there is a manere of Serpentes, be the whiche Men assayen and 
preven where here Children ben Bastardis or none, or of lawefulle Mariage. For 
zif thei ben born in righte Mariage, the Serpentes gon aboute hem, and don hem 
non harm : and zif thei ben born in Avowtrie, the Serpentes byten hem and 
envenymehem" (p. 54). 

"And no man may drynken of the Watre, for bytternesse. And zif a man caste 
Iren there in, it wole flete abouen. And zif men caste a Fedre, it wole synke to 
the botme : and theise ben thinges azenst kynde" (p. 100). 

"By twyne the Cytee of Darke and the Cytee of Raphane, ys a Ryvere, that 
men clepen Sabatorye. For on the Saturday, hyt renneth faste ; and alle the 
Wooke elles, hyt stondeth stylle, and renneth nouzt or lytel. And thare ys a 
nother Ryvere that upon the nyzt freseth wondur faste ; and uppon the day, ys 
noon Frost sene " (p. 125). 

"In that partie is a Welle, that in the day it is so cold, that no man may 
drynke there ofle ; and in the nyght it is so hoot, that no man may suffre his bond 
there in" (p. 156). 

"For righte as the fyn Perl congelethe and wexethe gret of the Dew of Hevene, 
righte so dothe the verray Dyamand : and right as the Perl of his owne kynde 
takethe Roundnesse, righte so the Dyamand be vertu of God, takethe squarenesse. 
And men schalle here the Dyamaund on his left syde : for it is of grettere vertue, 
thanne, than on the righte syde " (p. 159). 

"Aftre that men token the Adamand, that is the Schipmannes Ston, that 
drawethe the Nedle to him, and men leyn the Dyamand upon the Adamand, and 
leyn the Nedle before the Ademand, and zif the Dyamand be gode and vertuous, 
the Ademand drawethe not the Nedle to him, whils the Dyamand is there present. 
. . . Natheless it befallethe often tyme, that the gode Dyamande lesethe his 
vertue, be syne and for Incontynence of him, that berethe it : and thanne it is 
nedfulle to make it to recoveren his vertu azen, or elle it is of litille value" 
(p. 161).^ 

That the writer of the Ancren Riwle ^ was greatly impressed with 
the didactic value of illustrations drawn from the field of fabulous 
natural history is evident. This thirteenth century manual, re- 
markable for its fine prose has, as its most marked artificiality, many 
such illustrations. Characteristic specimens are the following : 

bredeth in : and is called Rasyn. And as there is but one byrde Phenix bredyng 
in Arable : so lykewise there is no more trees in the world of the same kynde" 
(Cap. XLViii). 

Cf. The Diallof Princes: "And it was closed with II lyddes very fine of red 
woode, whiche they cal rasin, of a tree where the phenix (as they saye) breadeth, 
whiche dyd growe in Arabia. And as there is but one oneleye, so in the worlde 
is there but one onelye tree of that sorte" (Cap. LVil). 

1 Cf. Bond, I, 321, 1. 2, and note on p. 373. 

* James Morton, The Ancren Riwle, Camden Society Publications, No. 57, 
London, 1853. 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 81 

" Ajein bittre ancren Dauid seW Hs uers, 'Similis f actus sura pellicano solitu- 
dinis, etc. Ich am ase pellican, lie sei'S, J^et wunie'5 bi him one. Proprietas 
pelicani.' PelUcan'^ is a leane fowel, so weamod 1 so wre'Sful )?et hit sleaS ofte uor 
grome his owune briddes, hwon heo teonelS him, ant beonne sone \>qv efter hit 
bicume'5 swu'Se sori, ■] make-S swucie muche mone, T smit him suluen mid his 
bile > hit slouh er his briddes mide, '^ drauhS ut blod of his breoste, "J mit tet 
blod acwikeS eft his isleiene briddes. pis pellican is J^e weamode ancre. Hire 
briddes, ^et beo'5 hire gode werkes, t>et heo slea'5 ofte mid bile of schearpe wre'5'Se : 
auh hwon heo so haue'5 idon, do ase de'5 }>e pellican : of hunche hit swulSe sone, 
■3 mid hire owune bile bekie hire breoste : Jjet is mid schrifte of hire mulSe J^et heo 
sunegede mid, ~] slouh hire gode werkes, drawe \>e blod of sunne ut of hire breoste, 
)>et is, of t>e heorte, J^et soule lif is inne, ~\ so schulen eft acwikien hire isleiene 
briddes, \>et heo'5 hire werkes" (p. 118). 

" f>eo briddes fleo'S wel \>e:l habbe'5 Intel flesch, ase J^e pellican haue^, J monie 
uederen. \>e steorc uor his muchele flesche make's a sembilaunt uorte vieon, J 
beate'S J)e hwingen : auh l>e fette drauh-g euer to J^er eorde. Al right so, fleschlich 
ancre l>et luue'S flesches lustes foluwed hire else, J?e heuinesse of hire flesche ~i 
flesches un'Seawes binime'5 hire hire vluht : ^ tauh heo makie semblaunt, t) 
muchel noise mid te hwingen, \>et is, leten of ase J>auh heo fluwe ~i were an holi 
ancre" (p. 132). 

" Of dumbe bestes J of dumbe fueles leorne'5 wisdom ~i lore. J^e earn d&S in his 
neste enne deorewur"Se gimston l^et hette achate. Vor non attri t>inc ne mei i>ene 
ston neilien, ne \>eo hwule t>et he is in his neste hermen his briddes. t>es deore- 
wurlSe ston, \>et is lesu Crist, ase ston treowe "J ful of alle mihten, ouer alle 
gimstones" (p. 134).' 

" pe scorpiun is ones cunnes wurm J>et haued neb, ase me sei'S, sum del iliche 
ase wummon, ~} is neddre bihinden, make'S feir semblaunt, 'J tike's mid te heaued, 
•] stinge-S mid te teile" (p. 206). 

"Loke nu >et tu i>et he cleope^ kulure, habbe kulure kunde, J>et is wi'Suten 
galle" (p. 292). 2 

"pe deouel is beorekunnes, and haue^ asse kunde: vor he is behinden strong, 
and feble i'Se heaued, \>et is, i'Se urum^e, and so is beore ] asse. Ne jif him 
nuer ingong : auh tep him o'Se schulle, uor he is eruh ase beore J?eron : and hie 
him so J'coneward, 3 ascur him so scheomeliche, so sone so \>i\ undergitest him, 
\>et he hold him ischend, and J^et him agrise wi^ l^e stude \>et tu wunest inne : vor 
he is Hnge prudest, and him is scheome lodest" (p. 296). 

' ' Orickisclis fur is imaked of reades monnes blode : and tet ne mei no"Singe bute 
migge, and sond, and eisil, ase me sei'S acwenchen. pis Grickische fur is i>e luue 
of ure Lorde : and je hit schulen makien of reades monnes blode, t>et is Jesu 
Crist i-readed mid his owune blo15e o^e rode. And was in-read kundeliche also, 
ase me wene^. pis blod, for, ou i-sched upo \>e herde two treon, schal makien ou 
Sarepciens : j^et is, ontenden ou mid Grickische fure, \>et, ase Salemon sei'S, none 
wateres, Jjet beo^ worldliche temptaciuns ne tribulaciuns, nou'Ser inre ne uttre, 
ne muwen l?eos luue acwenchen. Nu, nis J>er, ))eonne, on ende, buten witen ou 

' Cf. Bond, I, 261, 1. 24, and note on p. 354. 
-Cf. Ibid., II, 105, 1. 4, and note on p. 513. 



82 The Prose Style of Richard RoUe of Hanvpole. 

warliche urom alle \>eo t>ing J>et bit acwenche'5, J>et bee's migge, ~) sond, '] eiseb 
Migge is stench of sunne. O sond ne growe'S no god, and bitocne'S idel : and idel 
acoaldeS ^ acwenche^ )?is fur. Sturie'5 ou euer cwicliche iue Gode werkes, 'J )>et 
scbal beaten ou ~] ontenden )?is fur agean j^e brune of sunne. Vor, al so as on neil 
driue'S ut J>en o'Serne, al so \>q brune of Godes luue driue'S brune of ful luue ut of 
J>e heorte. pet J^ridde \>mg is eisil : )>et is sur heorte, of x\\^ "] of onde. Under- 
stonde'5 }>is word, po J>eo niSfule Giws oflreden ure Louerde )>is sure present o 
rode, \>o seide he J>et reou'Sfule word ' Consummatutn est ' ! Cwe'5 he, ' Neuer er 
nu nes ich ful pined ' : nout J^uruh J^et eisel, auh huruh hore ontfule ni^, t>et tet 
eisel bitocnaede, )'et heo him makeden drincken" (p. 403). 



GENERAL CONCLUSIONS. 

The results of the preceding paper may be summarized as 
follows : 

1. Our study of representative Middle English prose revealed 
a conscious effort to produce an attractive style by the use of 
various devices such as alliteration, repetition, balance, antithesis, 
and figures drawn from natural history. These artificialities are 
used in a manner so suggestive of the rhetoric of Ephuism, that 
the entire body of prose studied may be said to be Euphuistic in 
tendency. 

2. Of the writers studied, Richard Rolle gave the most striking 
results. His peculiarities of style and the way in which they are 
used, if found in a work of the early sixteenth century, would 
undoubtedly entitle it to the designation of Euphuistic. Were 
there a succession of writers with unbroken literary traditions, 
leading from the early fourteenth century up to the Ephuists of 
the sixteenth century, Richard Rolle would be considered a fore- 
runner of Berners, North, Pettie, and Lyly. Richard Rolle's 
prose may, therefore, be considered the earliest, original prose 
exhibiting a style anticipatory of the highly developed Ephuism 
of Lyly and his school. It is a matter of regret that our most 
popular school Histories of English Literature pay no attention 
to Richard Rolle and so little to the prose writings of his time. 

3. The main cause for the over-refined Ephuism of the six- 
teenth century was the direct study and imitation (1), of classic 
and patristic Latin prose (2), of Spanish prose, either directly, 



The Prose Style of Richard Rolle of Hampole. 83 

or by way of French translations. The Spanish had received its 
marked coloring, notably of sentence-structure, from over-imi- 
tation of Latin prose. Middle English had, of course, no similar 
Romance models. Its agreements with sixteenth century prose 
are due to the direct imitation of classic and patristic features of 
style. The immediate source of the earlier period became the 
ultimate source of the later. 

To the list of sources for Richard Rolle we must add the De 
Amicitia of Cicero, a writer whose style made him a favorite in 
the sixteenth century. 



LIFE 



I was born June 27, 1872, at New York, N. Y. In the public 
schools of that city and at Hartwick Seminary, Otsego Co., N. Y., 
I received my preliminary education. In 1896 I was graduated 
from Wittenberg College, Springfield, O., with the degree of 
A. B. The year following I spent as a student in Hamma Divinity 
School, Springfield, O. I entered Columbia University in 1897 
where I took courses under Professors Price, W. H. Carpenter, 
Thomas, Brander Matthews, and Jackson, leading to the degree 
of A. M., which I received in June, 1898. I enrolled, in the fall 
of 1898, at the Johns Hopkins University where I studied under 
Professors Bright, Browne, Wood, Vos, Griffin, Adams, Bloom- 
field, and Doctors Baker, Blake, and Ness. From 1899 to 1901, 
in connection with my regular university work, I was Instructor 
in English and German at the Randolph-Harrison School of 
Baltimore. In 1901 I was appointed University Scholar for the 
department of English and in 1902 Fellow in English. In 
June, 1904, I was elected Professor of English in Wittenberg 
College. It is a pleasant duty to thank my various instructors 
for the help they have affi^rded me. To Professor Bright I 
am especially indebted for the warm interest he has always shown 
in my career. His ideals of work and his own example as 
investigator and teacher are a constant inspiration. 



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